


It's just a test drive

by varevare (varebanos)



Category: Voltron: Legendary Defender
Genre: Blow Jobs, Conspiracy Theories, Galaxy Garrison, Hurt/Comfort, Injury Recovery, Keith as a thirsty gay, Lance as a depressed bi, Langst, M/M, More tags to be added, Mutual Pining, Nonbinary Pidge | Katie Holt, Roommates, Slow Burn
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2017-02-27
Updated: 2017-10-12
Packaged: 2018-09-27 04:22:54
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 38,113
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/9963434
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/varebanos/pseuds/varevare
Summary: Keith likes sticking his nose in every shady thing around the Galaxy Garrison, and finds himself taking care of more that he can handle.Lance. Lance is more that he can handle.





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Hello and welcome to my newest fic! After Cross-steps I really wanted to try doing a canon fic, so this is set in the Galaxy Garrison.
> 
> Also it's gonna have porn in the future.
> 
> Enjoy!
> 
> (Also I'm making Cross-steps stickers and I'm going to do a giveaway for them so keep an eye on my blog it's @varevare on tumblr)

Keith was having dinner when it happened. The mess hall still wasn’t full, since most of the Garrison students used the time after classes to socialize. They liked to stretch those hours as much as possible, which meant delaying dinner as much as the timetable allowed.

Keith, meanwhile, liked being the first to arrive and pick the pizza slices with the most cheese on top. Priorities.

It wasn’t like he had much socializing to do. Just a week earlier, Shiro had left for the Kerberos mission, and Keith had no one else he’d call a friend in there. His engineer and navigator for the simulations made him uncomfortable, always standing a bit too close and touching him a bit too much. Which, one might think, could lead to believe they were friends. Keith, however, only found it aggravating. They seemed more interesting in making others think they were Keith’s friends than in actually befriending him. Shiro had never done that.

And with Shiro gone, fresh cheesy pizza had climbed to the top of Keith’s evening priorities. Adjusting his uniform, he walked to the kitchen workers with his well practiced smile. Not too cocky, not too shy, just as eager as necessary. He hadn’t taken long after he first started eating there to find out the perfect levels to get him whatever he wanted from the menu. A great way to use his own free time, in Keith’s opinion.

The right level of uninterested staring to dissuade people from sitting on his table was the second part of this. No one shoving his tray to make space or petting his arm to get his attention. No awkward chit chat. Thank you. He wanted to enjoy his pizza in peace.

He did not get to enjoy his pizza in peace.

Just as he was taking his first bite, he heard a faint booming noise coming from outside the building. The windows rattled, and the water in his glass swished back and forth lightly.

Then, nothing for two seconds, and suddenly everyone was rushing outside to see what had happened.

And even though Keith couldn’t care less about military school gossip, he very much cared about mysterious explosions on space exploration bases. So, with a last regretful glance at his pizza, he shoved his tray backwards and ran after his classmates.

At night, it was hard to see anything. Far from the mess hall, around the area where Keith knew the testing labs were, a plume of smoke could be seen, barely visible under the fading light from the drones flying above it. 

Keith was familiar with the area, because he’d tried to sneak in for the first week he spent at the Garrison.  _ Tried _ being the key word. He’d gotten caught, too, which had been quite the blow to his pride, and he would have gotten in a lot of trouble if Shiro hadn’t been there to bail him out.

Either way, the area was off limits, and a couple of security guards were already signaling people to return inside. Disappointed, Keith returned to his now cold pizza, his head still stuck on the smoke outside. He could heard alarms faintly in the distance. He ate half his meal and left the mess hall, trying to find a better vantage point to see the grounds, even if it was from the inside.

He didn’t find it, but he did find rumors travel faster than the Garrison’s best ships.

From what he overheard, in bits and pieces of hushed conversations around the corridors, there had been an accident in the E4 plant. They were using an actual pilot, which was the reason everyone was so alarmed. The pilot had, apparently, been blown to bits. It was an interesting detail, even if still disappointing compared to Keith’s initial theory -that is, an alien spaceship trying to destroy the secret weaponry getting developed on Garrison grounds.

Accidents weren’t all that rare. Keith had heard of at least three on his first year there, although perhaps this one had been the most spectacular one. If the rumors were true, however, it’d be the first fatality, as far as he knew. If that were true, they’d probably have the teacher say some words in the morning. Maybe.

Having given up on his search, Keith turned around to made his way back to the cadets’ rooms. Everyone was speaking animatedly in front of the doors, making the way back a bit difficult. Keith ended up getting stuck behind a group of ten who were discussing the odds of classes getting cancelled the next day to attend the funeral. Now, Keith knew that was fake, and as such, became immediately uninterested in it. As if Iverson would ever let them skip a midterm to fake cry for a guy they hadn’t known.

Out the corner of his eye, Keith noticed another guy who seemed as unhappy to be there as Keith himself. Tall, big, and despite his darker complexion, pale as a sheet. Keith was pretty sure he’d seen him around his classes from time to time, but not often enough for him to be another pilot. Either way, he always said hi when he saw Keith, and didn’t bother him otherwise. That put him pretty high on Keith’s list of favorite classmates.

“Hey, are you alright?” Keith asked him, because yeah, he wasn’t great at socializing, but he wasn’t a total asshole. And the other guy looked like he might puke. “I don’t think they’re going to make us go to the funeral.”

“Oh my god,” the guy said, and yeah, he didn’t look alright at all. “That can’t be right. He can’t be dead.”

“He?” Keith blinked, taking more of the other guy in. His hands were shaking, and his eyes were lost somewhere in the wall. Shit. Did he know the pilot? Keith imagined if the person caught in the explosion had been Shiro, and suddenly, he could understand the guy way too well. 

Running his hand through his hair nervously, Keith looked around, hoping to find someone more adequate as a grief counselor. Everyone was still chatting excitedly in their own groups, not looking outside to notice Keith’s distress. Great.

Taking a deep sigh, and hoping to appear more calm than he felt, he set a hand on the other guy’s arm.

“Hey, so um, we don’t actually know if anyone died, you know? There’s the smoke, and stuff, but like. We don’t know? They’ll tell us tomorrow. There’s no sense in worrying right now, you get me?” Seeing the other guy’s face go from white to green made Keith feel like he was doing a terrible job, but well, no one else seemed to be going to. “Can I... get you a bottle of water? Or something?”

The guy shook his head slowly, but, to Keith’s surprise and relief, he didn’t proceed to puke the contents of his stomach in front of his feet.

“No, thank you. I’ll be-” he took in a ragged breath, making brief contact with Keith’s eyes. His own widened slightly, seemingly recognizing Keith. It was a look Keith got used to since joining the Garrison. “Oh. Yeah, sorry, I’ll be fine. Thanks.”

Keith nodded at him stiffly and watched him make his way through the groups. People parted to let him pass, apparently the color of his face enough to push them back. Keith wished for a moment he shared that power, then remembered the circumstances that led that guy to look like that and immediately changed his mind.

“See you then,” Keith called after him, a bit too late for him to hear.

Great, now he wasn’t going to be able to rest thinking of the accident, too. Maybe he’d text Shiro before going to sleep, make sure he was still alive.

 

* * *

 

 

 

Unsurprisingly, Keith had practically forgotten about the incident by the following morning, regardless of how long it took him to fall asleep. He went through his morning routine in his usual daze. Shower, uniform, grabbing his tablet, head towards class dragging his feet. The people he walked past didn’t look any better, the excitement about the previous night’s events having already evaporated with the wake up call. He wished he’d taken a cold shower to wake himself up, but his mattress was comfortable, and the water came out warm automatically, and he wasn’t motivated enough to change it. Truth be told, he’d spent an hour under the stream had it not cut off automatically.

The fighter pilot rooms were particularly good, and not having to share them was even better. It was a rare privilege in the Garrison, and one Keith knew he wouldn’t be keeping for long. After all, his roommate had gotten kicked a full week ago, and there was no shortage of candidates to take his position. Keith hadn’t been friends with him, only seeing him late nights and early mornings. They weren’t in the same program, and Keith didn’t even know what mess did he get himself into to get expelled.

He could have found out about it, of course. Gossip travelled fast. He simply was more concerned about enjoying his privacy and freedom until Iverson took it away.

Thinking in that line, Keith wasn’t even that surprised to see Iverson standing in the classroom when he arrived. He stood next to the Physics teacher, both silent and waiting for the class to fill. They made a strange contrast. Iverson had his usual stern look and ramrod straight back, while their teacher was a frail pale man wearing square glasses. He seemed to float inside the instructors’ uniform, and seemed as intimidated as the students. Everyone fell silent as they stepped through the door the moment they laid eyes on the strange pair, making a strange atmosphere settle over the classroom.

It took Keith a minute too long to realize Iverson probably wasn’t there to announce Keith’s new roommate. Damn, maybe there had really been a death in the testing grounds last night. Remembering the other student he’d tried -weakly- to comfort the previous night, Keith sat up straighter, feeling a pang of guilt in his stomach. It served as a reminder of why he shouldn’t get involved with others. Now, the mysterious and fascinating incident was personal.

“Good morning, students. As you might have realized, my presence here at this time of the day is somewhat out of ordinary. Indeed, I’m here for a very important reason.” Iverson turned on the screen on the front wall. Keith was divided between his morbid curiosity and his desire to turn the whole conversation off. “Under certain unusual circumstances, a new student is joining the fighter pilot class.”

Immediately, murmurs raised around the classroom. Keith, however, didn’t listen to them this time. He just sat there in disbelief. Had Iverson really come to the class to announce Keith’s new roommate? It was beyond ridiculous.

“I’m not finished!” Iverson snapped, slamming his hand against the teacher’s table. Both the teacher and the whole front row flinched. “There is a reason I’m here. The student in question has a... temporary handicap, and will require some aid in order to attend his classes.”

The screen flickered to show the profile of the student in question. Interestingly enough, the medical information appeared to be censored, but Keith’s eyes got caught in the picture. Tan skin, bright eyes, too-big ears...

Keith had seen him around the Garrison before, in the company of a certain student that had been on Keith’s mind. One that had been practically shaking the night before, and alone, after the news about the accident spread.

It couldn’t be a coincidence.

Inadvertently, Keith had stopped paying attention to the class, and missed Iverson’s explanation. He only came back to the present when he heard the word  _ volunteer. _

“Does anyone volunteer to aid your new classmate?” It sounded more like a threat than a request of help. “It will be recorded in your file, showing your dedication and self-less-”

Keith raised his hand, stopping Iverson halfway.

“I could do it, sir.” He tried to sound as uninterested as possible, because earning extra credit would look better than earning confidential information about the Incident. “Also, I don’t have a roommate right now. He could move in with me, it’d be easier that way.”

“Excellent,” Iverson replied immediately. “Come with me. Vasiliev, continue the class.”

Keith blinked in surprise. He thought his motives would get questioned, but it seemed like Iverson wanted to get over with the issue as fast as possible. He started walking towards the door without waiting for Keith. Barely grabbing his tablet, Keith rushed after him, hearing the teacher’s monotone voice start talking as he closed the door.

They walked in silence, Keith five feet behind Iverson. No one they crossed -the corridors much emptier now that the classes had started- spared a glance in their direction. Or more likely, they avoided looking at them on purpose. No one would convince Keith that there wasn’t something fishy going on. 

He was unsurprised when they crossed over to the hospital module. It didn’t, in theory, see much movement besides treating bruises from the simulator and some minor illnesses. Other than that, it was off limits, so Keith couldn’t help but raise his eyebrows when they arrived to an area labelled as ICU. There, they stopped in front of a room labelled T1, which was the only one currently closed. Even though the empty, metallic walls and floors were the same as in the rest of the base, something about the atmosphere there gave Keith the chills. He’d never liked hospitals, and he hadn’t ever thought he’d be in one that morning.

Just ten minutes after volunteering and he was already learning more about the Garrison than in the last semester. He’d pat himself in the back if he could.

“Here he is. I’m a very busy man and I can’t spend any more time on this. You’re excused from the rest of your morning classes. Find a nurse to help you with the rest.”

Without saying goodbye, he turned around and left, power walking out of the building. He really seemed to be dying to leave, and suddenly Keith wished he’d paid more attention to the other’s file.

He took a step forward towards the room’s door, and... absolutely nothing happened. Looking around, he noticed the card reader next to it, a red light blinking on it.

“Isn’t this a bit much?” Keith muttered under his breath, starting to get annoyed. Sometimes the Garrison was just red tape for the sake of red tape. If his new roommate was healthy enough to join the fighter pilot program, he should be healthy enough to receive visits, didn’t he?

Poking the card reader or pressing his own ID against it yielded no results. It was as if Keith wasn’t there. No answer when he knocked on the door, either, so after a minute he set off to find a nurse.

With all the corridors looking the same and half the doors being inaccessible for his current clearance -which was none, really- it took him entirely too long to find any staff. After what felt like half an hour, he spotted two people next to a coffee machine, and ran up to them.

“Hey! I need to get into the room T1!” Keith explained immediately, which only got him raised eyebrows. The two men looked at him up and down, pausing on Keith’s cadet uniform.

“This area is off limits. What are you doing here?” the taller of the two asked, setting his coffee down on a nearby table and reaching for his comm. His look spelled trouble for Keith.

“I’m trying to get into room T1. I mean, I have permission.” He wished he remembered the name of his new roommate, it’d make the conversation less awkward. Then again, he doubted Iverson had known, either. With a huff, Keith tried to push his frustration down. The Garrison sometimes had that effect on him. “I- my new roommate is there. I offered to help him attend to classes, and Iverson told me to pick him up. I couldn’t find any nurses, though.”

“Oh, that’s Lance Sánchez, of course. Why didn’t you just say so?” the shorter man replied, gesturing at the other one to leave the comm. “You could have saved us a lot of time. Let’s continue our chat later, Rob.”

Keith simply glared at them, not trusting himself to do anything else.

Not putting his coffee down, the man waved the other bye and started walking back towards where Keith came from. When he caught up with Keith, he started talking between sips of his cup.

“So you’re probably going to need a wheelchair to get him all the way into the room, he’s going to be pretty out of it for a while. It’s the meds, you know? I’m going to give you some pills for the first week but they won’t be as bad, he should manage with crutches as long as he’s just going to class and back.”

“Why the crutches?” Keith asked him, unable to hide his curiosity. He didn’t want the Garrison to catch on his true intentions. The man, however, seemed to be both chatty and unintimidating.

Shorter than Keith, too, which was always a plus.

“Oh, you don’t know?” the man asked him condescendingly. Keith could forgive that, as long as he got the info. “Reconstructive ACL surgery. He’s got two broken ribs, too, and pretty heavy bruising.” He paused. “Huh, now that I think about it, he might need to keep that wheelchair for a couple of days. But that boy got pretty lucky. The tests showed no internal damage, and that new helmet really did its job, because we checked before putting him under for the surgery and he showed no signs of a concussion. Last night here was crazy, though, I don’t know why Rob and I are the ones who have to work the morning shift, too. Been up for 30 hours now.”

“Damn, that sucks.” Keith tried to suppress a grin. “So, new helmet? Was he at some accident?”

“Oh. No. No, why would he?” the nurse replied stiffly. “Anyway, those details are irrelevant. You just have to help him a bit with the wheelchair and stuff. He’s going to get stuck with PT for a while, but that’s it.”

He stopped walking, and Keith realized they were in front of room T1 again. Except this time, the nurse walked over to the card reader and the door opened with a soft hiss.

Immediately, Keith peeked inside, his hands sweating. Inside the room there was just a hospital bed with a body and three screens on the wall, all showing charts Keith didn’t understand. He was vaguely aware of the nurse telling him to wait there while he grabbed the wheelchair.

Compared to the picture on the file Iverson had shown in class that morning, the boy in the bed looked much worse for wear. Half his body seemed covered in different degrees of bruises, and his skin was pale and clammy. The sheet covering him only seemed to highlight the length of his limbs, making him look like a broken doll someone had dropped on top of the bed. WHen Keith looked at his face, he noticed Lance’s eyes, half lidded, barely seemed to register Keith’s presence.

“Um, hi. I’m Keith. We’re roommates now,” Keith announced awkwardly.

The boy seemed to notice that, seemingly trying to make eye contact and sit up. However, in a second he grunted and lay back down, now breathing fast and shallow on top of everything else. Keith almost regretted speaking now.

“Alright, here it is,” the nurse said, arriving with a wheelchair. Keith turned around with a start. He’d been so distracted he hadn’t heard the other man come in. “I’ve put the crutches and meds on the back. I don’t think he’s going to get it right now, so I’ll tell you how to fold and unfold it later and you can explain him when he’s not so out of it. Let’s put him in here.”

The nurse pulled the thin hospital sheet back, revealing the rest of the hospital gown and a rather bulky brace around Lance’s left knee. Keith almost flinched seeing the rainbow colored bruise extending from it.

He walked over to help, holding onto Lance’s shoulders carefully. Soon, they managed to set him up on the wheelchair, Lance seemingly capable of sitting up, even if unaware of his surroundings. It was just uncomfortable to watch, and Keith couldn’t wait to get back in his room, put him on the bed, and ignore him until he got better.

“Alright, you’re all good to go.” The nurse patted Keith on the back. He seemed quite eager to get both students out of his hair and get back to his coffee. “Lead the way.”

Taking a breath, Keith held onto the wheelchair’s handles and started pushing.


	2. Chapter 2

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Thank you so much for the comments guys you're all amazing <3 I hope you're all up for a bit of Lance suffering (I do it because I care oks)
> 
> Iverson is just a mix of all my college teachers put together, and as such, not my favorite person. Not my least favorite either. He simply is.

The room was very cold and the light was very bright. That was the first thing he noticed when he opened his eyes- at least, as much as his eyelids would let him. They felt heavy. Everything felt heavy, Lance realized belatedly, unable to lift his hands from where they lay at his sides.

Maybe he was dead. He didn’t really want to be dead. He was just very tired, and everything felt dull, and he couldn't keep his eyes open anymore.

 

* * *

“Hey, Lance, what are you looking at?” Hunk leaned closer to Lance and tried to peek over his shoulder. “Keith is right there and you haven’t even mentioned him.”

“Sometimes I want to study in peace too, Hunk,” Lance sighed, glancing up at him before looking back down at his tablet. “And I’m not in the mood to see people fawning over  _ Keith _ , sorry.”

Hunk leaned back against his chair, taken aback. It was rare for Lance to be silent at the library. It was even rarer for him to snap at Hunk. Lance eyed him, feeling a bit guilty.

“...I’m sorry, Hunk. I just got a lot on my plate right now.” He sighed deeply, closing the email on his tablet. Looking at it wouldn’t make it go away. “Apparently, Iverson wants to see me. Says it has something to do with my ‘position’ in the Garrison. I don’t know what he might be talking about. I know I didn’t make the cut, and if I’m not going up, I can only be going down, you know?”

“Aw, man, don’t talk like that!” Hunk patted him on the back. However, Lance detected a small tremble in his voice. “You’re top of the cargo section, there’s no way they’re pushing you down.”

“Well, what does it matter? I don’t want to be a cargo pilot! I might as well not be here at all.”

Someone next to them on the long study table glared at Lance’s raised voice and shushed them. Lance just glared at them.

“Lance, come on. You might not have made it yet, but we still have years to go. Things can change, you can gain enough credits, someone might drop out... anything, dude.” The warm hand on Lance’s shoulder seemed to ground him, snapping him out of the vicious cycle of nerves and anxiety that threatened to eat him up. “You’ve gotten this far, you’re not giving up now. You don’t even know what Iverson’s going to tell you, it might be good news and everything.”

“Hah. Yeah, maybe.” Lance knew he still sounded unconvinced, but Hunk’s words had managed to dispel some of his doubts away. “I still don’t think I can concentrate on this assignment. I’m just killing time until five and then I’ll head there.”

“That’s fine. Special circumstances, dude, I get it.” Hunk squeezed Lance’s shoulder away before putting his hand away. “You don’t actually have much time left, anyway. Get going, I’ll manage on my own.”

Lance looked at the glowing number on the corner of his tablet and hissed.

“Shit, you’re right. Would you-”

“-help you out with the problems when you come back? Sure, but only after you try to do them by yourself,” Hunk teased him. “Come on, you have this.”

Lance stood up and gathered his things. He waved bye at Hunk and Pidge, who was sitting two chairs down. Still closer to them than anyone else, despite everything, and Lance liked to label it as progress. Pidge wouldn’t even come down to the library during the first week there.

He purposefully did not spare a glance at Keith, who was of course sitting on the best spot of the library and attracting the eyes of half the girls -and some of the boys- around him. The bane of his existence. Scoffing, he walked to the entrance, swiping his ID over the door, and tried to shove his catastrophic thoughts away. He noticed his hands were clammy, and he tried to wipe them on his pants. He highly doubted Iverson would shake his hand for any reason, but better safe than sorry.

The instructors’ offices were one floor up from the library, and rather busy at that time of the day. Some students were waiting in front of the offices, and Lance waved and exchanged a couple of words with everyone he knew. Any sort of friendly interaction was enough to momentarily make him not think about his meeting with Iverson, and as such, searched for and treasured.

Disappointingly soon, he was in front of Iverson’s door, and it was just two minutes before five. Figuring Iverson would hardly be staring at the clock waiting for his arrival, Lance decided to knock anyways. A couple seconds later, a voice called him to come in, and the door slid open.

Iverson’s office, although big, was rather bland. Standard equipment and furniture and official posters on the walls. It was at the same time lived in and unfriendly, and Lance always felt himself tensing up when he was in it.

Or maybe he just tensed up around Iverson. He wasn’t his favorite student, and the two of them knew it.

Iverson, however, seemed to be in a good mood that day, because he smiled when Lance walked in.

“Oh, you’re here early. Excellent. Take a seat, son.”

Lance was sure Iverson didn’t actually remember his name. At least he remembered he’d called him there. He took a seat across from him, the wide desk separating them.

“I received your message, sir. What did you want to tell me?” Lance was proud of how neutral his voice sounded.

“Yes, of course. You’ll see, a wonderful opportunity has arisen for you.” Iverson smiled again, and even though it was uncomfortable, Lance couldn’t help but to feel reluctantly hopeful. “Have you heard of the Albatross program?”

“Can’t say I have.”

“I would hope so. It’s a strictly confidential R&D program being currently developed here at the Garrison for a new type of space flight engine. As we speak, one of the machines is undergoing testing on the E4 plant.”

Lance could feel his interest peak at that. None of the students at the Garrison ever got to hear anything about the current missions and projects being developed there until the press releases. At worst, he’d get some gossip out of this.

“I see. How does this affect me, sir?” He spoke carefully, knowing he was still on unstable ground.

“Well, the program needs a testing pilot, and the official one is currently undergoing surgery. Appendicitis, can’t be helped. He’ll be back at work in no time whatsoever, but the Albatross is on a tight schedule to meet its budget goals. There was a test scheduled for yesterday, and it can’t be delayed any further. And that’s where you come in, son.” Iverson’s smile seemed to grow bigger, and Lance was more and more suspicious of the whole set up. “Wouldn’t you like to have the chance to pilot a state of the art spacecraft prototype?”

Jesus. Would Lance like to? Yes. Would the Garrison like him to? Fuck no. There was no way there wasn’t a trap in the offer. Why him, when not a month ago Iverson was telling him there was no way he’d make the cut into the fighter pilot program?

“I’m not-”

“Of course, you wouldn’t have to do it out of selflessness. As I said in my message, this can be a wonderful opportunity for your future. I remember how determined you were to make it into the fighter pilot class, and how you were top of those who didn’t make the cut. You have the determination and talent necessary, plus an extra dose of inventive that would be perfect for the testing plant. However, the Galaxy Garrison had to set a student limit somewhere, and can’t make exceptions just because. However, this wouldn’t be ‘just because’, do you understand what I’m saying here?”

Lance tried to reply, but his mouth had gone completely dry over the last minute.

It wasn’t possible. Could he just... was he even telling the truth? Would he really open up a spot for Lance in the fighter class? The concerns about how  _ shady _ the whole scenario seemed were still there at the back of his mind, but Lance could feel them start to vanish when opposed against his everlasting hope. Being a top class Space Pilot was the dream of his life, and who knew if he’d ever have another chance to get there? What if no one dropped out from the class, or Lance couldn’t stay top of the waiting list for some reason? Could he really risk it, when a chance was being presented in front of him like this?

“I understand, sir,” he finally managed to rasp out.

“The Garrison would greatly value your involvement with this project, and compensate your effort in a way I hope all the parties will find satisfactory. Of course, if you say yes, we can start the paperwork immediately. There are some papers you’ll have to sign before the testing, and I can put our agreement in writing as well. What do you say, cadet?”

Like Lance had any choice in the matter.

“I’d love to be a part of this project, sir.”

“Excellent, I knew you would. You have the drive of a fighter pilot.” Iverson stood up and offered Lance his hand. Lance followed his example in a hurry and took it, hoping his grip was firmer than his knees. “Of course, you understand that all the details about the Albatross program are strictly confidential, right?” Lance nodded. “Fantastic. Go talk to Taylor at Administration and he’ll give you everything you need. Then one of the officers will accompany you to the E4 plant and get you up to speed.”

With a nod and a feeling that he was being kicked out, Lance walked to the door and, once it was closed, leaned against the wall to catch his breath. Administration first, testing plant second.

But before, he needed to tell Hunk. Friends first, non disclosure agreements second. 

And he hadn’t signed anything yet, anyway.

 

* * *

The next time Lance opened his eyes, the dullness surrounding him was gone. All the colors were too sharp, and with the way his limbs ached he knew he wouldn’t be able to slip peacefully back into sleep.

He had to assume he wasn’t dead, because that was  _ Keith’s  _ face right in front of him. And wherever it was that Lance would end up in the afterlife, he was hoping he wouldn’t have to deal with  _ Keith  _ in there. He’d much rather see his abi, thank you very much.

His eyelids were still heavy, and he was dying of thirst. His attempt at telling the other boy to fuck off ended in just breathing out harshly, and went completely unnoticed.

Keith kept staring, his expression unreadable, and then a shorter man arrived pushing a wheelchair. Between the two of them, they manhandled Lance to sit on it. His eyelids were drooping, his limbs were heavy, and the only good thing Lance could see in the situation is that his mouth was  _ so  _ dry that he wouldn’t drool as they wheeled him wherever they were taking him.

Why did  _ Keith  _ have to be there? Of all the people to hang at his hospital room, he’d much rather have someone he didn’t know, or at the very least, Hunk. Really, any random classmate at all would be a better pick in order to salvage Lance’s pride.

He didn’t think he’d been there for long, although his memory was still patchy. Trying to remember felt like swimming through mud. Slowly, he drifted off again as he was taken down the white corridors.

 

* * *

The E4 plant was immense. It looked no different from any other warehouse in the Garrison, but the testing grounds seemed to extend underground indefinitely.

Looking up at the empty space that hosted the aircraft Lance was meant to test, Lance could only think of the ceiling of a cathedral. It made him feel dizzy, although that might have been the anxiety twisting in his guts. He’d finished his paperwork and dropped it off with Hunk. Hunk had seemed even more reluctant than Lance himself, but he hadn’t actually tried to reason Lance out of it. His friend knew him better than that.

And the paperwork had been legit. The fighter pilot class now had sixteen spots, and not fifteen. The changes had been made public already. Checking from Hunk’s pad, even the list of students in the Garrison’s database had been updated and accessible by anyone connected to it. Anyone who checked the fighter pilot class rooster would see Lance’s name in it. It had been so easy to just slip another student in.

Of course, they wouldn’t have done it if Lance hadn’t agreed to do the testing. Because Lance’s dreams didn’t matter, his usefulness did, and Lance might be a dreamer but he wasn’t blind to the circumstances surrounding them.

Hell for all he knew, had he said no, the Garrison might keep him out of the fighter pilot program forever, just out of spite. He didn’t put it past them.

Or maybe he was just bitter because of how easy it had been to just slip him in there.

He just had to stay up all night catching up with the Albatross testing schedule. Just do what the engineers said. Easy peasy.

The engineers seemed surprised when they saw him come in, pausing to take in his uniform, but everyone was clearly too busy to remark on it. The hangar was bustling with activity, people walking to and fro on what, Lance assumed, was unpaid overtime.

The ship didn’t seem like a big deal. Just bare bones, a cockpit, the engine, and the naked structure holding it together in an elongated shape. Lance found himself staring at it trying to identify the elements he’d been studying in class to determine what was its purpose before getting interrupted.

“You, are you here for the testing?” A stern looking woman stepped in front of him, carrying a bundle of clothes. “Put this on and make sure the helmet’s strapped on right.”

“Do you want me to get naked right here? Wow, you’re pretty fa-” Lance’s sentence was cut halfway when she shoved the bundle into his arms, hitting him with the helmet in the stomach and taking his breath away.

“We’re having issues with the engine overheating and we don’t know what might happen with it. Or with you.” The woman’s look seemed to soften for a second, and Lance couldn’t decide whether it was worry or pity he saw in her eyes before it disappeared. “The lead engineer is in the control room. He’s not going to tell you this, but according to the simulations, we should disassemble the motor and test it in a controlled environment. However, it’d take twice the time and manpower, and we cannot afford that. So get a move on already.”

Lance nodded and watched her leave. The sentry that had escorted him all the way there had disappeared during the exchange, so he walked to a semi hidden corner between some boxes and changed into the suit quickly. The helmet covered his whole head down to his shoulders, limiting his range of motion. The front was tinted red, which Lance thought was a nice touch. He wouldn’t be able to tell an oil spill apart from his own blood.

He couldn’t even enjoy his first time wearing a flight suit -although he was sure he cut a striking figure in it- thanks to the way the woman’s words kept sounding in his head.

He wasn’t convinced the pilot he was taking over for had appendicitis. Maybe he had quit.

Maybe Lance would never set foot in the fighter pilot class.

He should have called his mother before heading down to E4.

There was nowhere for him to run anymore, though. Another engineer caught sight of him and dragged him all the way to the control room. There, he was swarmed by instructions and safety protocols, with some basic explanations of what the prototype was meant to do. Barely five minutes later, he was being shoved into the cockpit, everyone else clearing out of the hangar and sticking to the control room.

Fortunately, the controls on the aircraft -machine, really, since at that stage it wouldn’t be able to fly- had the same interface as the ones in the simulators they had trained on. It was strange, being able to see the hangar through the incomplete casing. So close, yet it seemed to be impossibly far at the same time. 

Over the comms, an engineer listed each of the tests they wanted to run, giving him step by step instructions.

Everything seemed to go well, at first. Things always seem okay at first. Lance had even started to breathe more easily, when he noticed a small heat spike on the ship’s stats. It was only for a fraction of a second, but Lance had been watching out for it, the other engineer’s words still stuck in his head.

The voice over the comms seemed to notice it too, because it faltered for a second. Or perhaps that was Lance projecting.

“Hey, did you guys see that? The heat seemed to bump up for a second.” He didn’t think they’d pay attention to what he had to say, but shit, he had to try.

“That’s normal, the ventilation was able to deal with it. Don’t worry and continue the tests,” the voice replied after a couple of seconds.

Swallowing, Lance activated the engine again, trying to activate the outer shields at the same time as the propulsion systems. His hands were sweating inside the thick gloves, and his eyes kept going back to the thermometer, waiting for a spike at any moment.

It seemed to last forever, until the screens suddenly went off.

“We’ve lost power?” he asked through the comms, realizing right away that they were off too. Looking around the hangar, he saw a couple of engineers leaving the control room and rushing over, so he started to climb off the cockpit.

Next thing he knew, the hangar was upside down, and he was looking at the aircraft from thirty meters away.

The aircraft, which was now completely misshapen and on fire.

The ringing in his ears was awful, making his whole head hurt, although that might have been the impact against the wall. His visor had cracked in a certain section, smoke coming through and making his eyes water.

He really should have called his mother before getting in there.

A group of paramedics were suddenly at his side, hiding the fire from vision. They seemed to be in a hurry, although Lance didn’t feel a lot of pain. He guessed it was the adrenaline, they had studied something like that in first aid class. No pain didn’t mean he wasn’t dying. God, he hoped he wasn’t dying. That would  _ suck _ .

It was then that one of the paramedics injected Lance with a hypospray, and not half a second later, he lost consciousness.

 

* * *

He was in a different room. He was in  _ his _ room at the Garrison, Lance belatedly realized. The bed was pushed right next to the wall, and the light shining into his eyes was much warmer than the one at the hospital. He felt more awake, which also meant in more pain, but it didn’t hurt as much if he didn’t move at all, so that was okay.

He turned his head, expecting to see Hunk sitting on his own bed, or perhaps catching up with some homework, just to realize two things:

First, Hunk was not there.

Second, that was definitely not his room. Hunk never had weird photos of the desert pinned to the wall, or messy black sheets, or a combat flight textbook on the bedside table.

Lance would have known that book  _ anywhere _ .

The only two things he had for certain were his pain and the questions swarming around his head.

Glancing down, he realized he was still wearing hospital clothes. He was lying on top of the sheets, almost as if someone had just dropped him there and left. There was a brace around his left leg, and something told him he shouldn’t try to move it just yet. He managed to wiggle his toes, which was what people in the movies always did. Good enough. It meant he’d eventually feel his legs, or so he hoped. He was also out of the hospital, so he guessed that he’d be making a full recovery in the short term, whatever it was that he had to recover from.

The relief was almost dizzying, enough to make him forget about the pain and discomfort for a moment. He was alive, he would be in good health in the near future, he wasn’t expelled, he’d made it to fighter class. That was practically his best case scenario. Knowing that, Lance was sure he’d be able to deal with  _ anything _ life threw at him that day.

Lance was a quick thinker, and that sometimes meant he didn’t quite think things through. He was no stranger to regretting things he had said.

And yet, he had never regretted something like he regretted that last statement when the bedroom’s door opened, and Keith Kogane walked in.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Did I drop off just as the klance interaction was gonna happen? Why yes, yes I did. Something to look forward to :3c
> 
> Thanks to winterysomnium and sage-exe for their help with this! And as usual, you guys can find me on tumblr under varevare or twitter @shiroganbatte!!


	3. Chapter 3

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Ok so this is a bit late but it's 4k and as such the longest chapter I've ever written so there. Have some boys. They're both finally awake and in each other's presence. Amazing, I know. Enjoy!

The moment Keith stepped into the room, Lance saw red.

“What are  _ you _ doing here?”

“This is my room,” Keith deadpanned, seemingly unsurprised to see Lance there. “Did the painkillers lose effect already?”

Lance tried to sit up, but the sudden movement made him dizzy, forcing him to lie back down. If only. He still felt like he was floating on a cloud. Or, more specifically, being suffocated by it.

The memory of the explosion rushed back to his head. He breathed in and out shakily, trying to calm himself down, but it was no use. It took him a minute for his heartbeat to regain a normal pace, and by then he started to felt the pain in his ribs. His whole left side protested when he took a deep breath. It was hard to not hyperventilate just breathing shallowly, and while Lance tried to find a balance, Keith walked past him to sat on his desk. Apparently, Lance wasn’t even interesting enough to stare at during a panic attack.

“You didn’t answer my question,” Lance protested once he felt well enough to trust his voice.

“I did. It’s my room, why wouldn’t I be here?” 

Keith didn’t even turn his head to reply to Lance. It only pissed Lance off more. Gathering all his strength -which wasn’t much- he managed to sit up. As it turned out, the only thing within reach was the pillow on the bed, so he threw that at the back of Keith’s stupid haircut to get him to turn around. Which he did, his usual pissed off expression in place. Lance returned a smug look.

“You brought me here. Why would you bring me to your room?”

“Because we’re roommates now. You’re in the fighter pilot class now, and the Garrison needed someone to help you attend the classes while you recovered.”

There were so many issues in Keith’s statement Lance wasn’t sure what to reply to first.

“Wait, so you’ve managed to get in so much trouble you got punished by having to take care of me? Oh my god, that’s  _ hilarious _ .” Lance grinned. “Wait until I tell Hunk that  _ Keith Kogane _ has to play nurse.”

Somehow, Keith’s expression managed to get even more sour at that.

“Just so you know, I  _ volunteered _ ,” Keith snapped, throwing the pillow back at Lance’s face. Lance didn’t manage to catch it on time.

“Like  _ hell  _ you did.” Lance glared back at him. “I bet you’re only looking for a way to make me fail the classes. What, can’t take the competition?”

He shoot Keith a smug look. Keith just glared at him for a second before turning away, not bothering to reply.

Classic mistake. He’d forgotten the pillow was back in Lance’s hands.

The awkward yelp he got from it made the whole hospitalization worth it, in Lance’s opinion.

“Will you stop it!” Keith yelled at him, standing up. His hair had gotten messier in the spot the pillow hit him, sticking up in strange angles.

Lance couldn’t help it and broke down laughing. Keith just stared at him like he’d lost his mind, but he couldn’t care less about it right at that moment. The coughs that kept interrupting him were slightly more bothersome, making him stop after a while with a hiccup. Breathing was starting to get a bit harder again, and his vision less hazy. So much for painkillers.

Not that he’d admit it to Keith.

“I don’t have to stop anything. This is my room now,” Lance wheezed.

“Yes, and you’re being an asshole. I’m helping you, you dumbass!”

“Yeah, out of the kindness of your heart, I’m sure.”

“No, because I felt sorry for your pathetic face!”

Lance’s difficulty breathing at that point might not have been because of his injuries alone.

“...I’m seriously trying to help.”

“Like  _ hell _ you are. I want back to my room, I’m sure Hunk doesn’t have anyone assigned yet.”

“Listen-”

“Fuck  _ off _ , Keith,” Lance snapped, trying to get off the bed.

He was still scared about moving his left leg, so it was taking a bit of shuffling. Before he could get anywhere, though, there was a knock at the door.

The two of them looked at each other and the door, and then, without a word, Keith walked there to open it.

“Lance!”

“Hunk?” Lance asked, trying to see around Keith, but his field of vision was immediately invaded by his friend’s figure. A figure that immediately went for the soul crushing hug.

Involuntarily, Lance yelped. Hunk had made contact with some still-tender bruise somewhere. Lance wasn’t even sure of where, since his whole body was starting to feel like a bruise. However, Hunk released him right away and started apologizing profusely.

“Dude, I’m so sorry, I shouldn’t- Are you alright?”

“Yeah, no worries, I’m fine, just a bit shaken.” Lance coughed, the sound reverberating through his whole torso. It hurt. “It doesn’t even hurt. How are you?”

Hunk narrowed his eyes, and Lance noticed the shadows right under them. Coupled with his faded pallor, it was worrisome. Even during finals last year he hadn’t seen Hunk that sickly looking. Maybe he was the one that should have been at the hospital.

“How am I? I’m  _ sick _ with worry, that’s what. Be glad I didn’t call your family, they’d have your head over this.”

Lance felt his own eyes go wide.

“Hunk, what-”

“I thought you were  _ dead _ . We only heard the explosion, and everyone kept talking about how a test pilot died, and you had disappeared. And when I finally heard you were in the hospital wing and got there they told me your  _ roommate _ picked you up.” Hunk crossed his arms over his chest. “What the hell, Lance?”

“Um.” Lance ducked his head sheepishly. “Would it help if I told you I didn’t have a hand on any of that? For real.” He gestured around the room with a hand. “I didn’t even know where I was when I woke up. I thought it was our room. No one asked for my opinion on any of this.”

Hunk sighed, his shoulders finally relaxing for the first time since Lance told him about Iverson’s offer. It was then that Lance realized there was no sign of Keith in the room. He hadn’t even noticed him leave.

“I just don’t like it. It’s so shady.” He sat next to Lance on the bed.

“Yeah, tell me about it.” Lance pondered for a moment whether he should tell Hunk about the accident itself, but decided against it. It wouldn’t help him feel any better, and Lance would be very happy never having to relive it again. “On the other hand, it’s not gonna get any shadier than this, huh? They have to cover their own ass, so I’m fighter class now. Keith offered to take me in just to be a jerk, but we both know I’ve dealt with worse.”

“Keith did what now?” Hunk frowned a bit, glancing at the room as well. “Listen, I know you have that weird obsession with him, but I don’t think he’s the type of person who would do that...”

“Shows what you know,” Lance replied with a snort, which turned into a cough as well. “He pretty much admitted it, too.”

“I’m sure that conversation didn’t go like that,” Hunk huffed, pushing at Lance’s shoulder. “Why do you need a new roommate anyway?”

“I um. I apparently can’t walk.” Lance glanced at the brace. “I mean. I haven’t tested it yet. But I’m not sure I can. There’s a wheelchair over there, too. And I think they wanted someone with the same class schedule than I would have?”

Hunk replied with a noncommittal noise. “I guess that makes some sense. Maybe.” He shrugged. “Do you want me to take you to pick your stuff? I could push the wheelchair.”

Lance flinched slightly at the idea, but upon brief consideration, he had to admit Hunk wheeling him to pick his things was better than  _ Keith _ doing that. And he didn’t feel all that sure about using crutches just yet. He’d need to learn before class tomorrow, but the light through the window made him guess it was early enough that he still had some time.

“Sure, yeah. We might need a couple of trips, though.”

“Oh, I’m well aware. You can leave some stuff, anyway. I can bring it to you later, or maybe you can come back when your leg is better.”

“God, I  _ hope _ so,” Lance breathed out, and he didn’t like the way pity looked on Hunk’s eyes. “Come on, big guy, let’s get out of here.”

Hunk went to unfold the wheelchair. In true engineering form, he figured it out way sooner than Lance figured out how to move his leg. In true best friend form, he didn’t mention anything about Lance’s awkward shuffling. When Lance managed to get his knee to bend enough to put it over the edge of the bed he helped him to limp to the wheelchair. 

By the time they were all set up, there were tears in the corner of Lance’s eyes, and he was breathing harshly. His ribs were also not doing him any favors. It dawned upon him that he probably would need some painkillers to make it through the day, but either the Garrison hadn’t bothered to give him any or Keith hadn’t bothered to mention them to him. No way to ask him now. He was probably showing off how he’d practically picked Lance off the street and what a model student he was.

Lance was really, really happy the dorm area was empty at that time of the day. He’d never realized just how far two bedrooms could be in there.

The familiar sight of their door and their room immediately cheered him up, until he realized that ah, of course. He wasn’t going to be living there anymore.

It looked exactly like it had the night before, except that Hunk’s bed was still unmade. It was a rare sight, but Hunk’s expression when Lance looked up at him didn’t make him want to ask. Instead, he pointed at his dresser.

“Can you help me get changed? I don’t want to keep wearing this dumb thing.”

“At least be happy it’s not one of those that leave your ass on display,” Hunk teased.

It was humiliating to need help getting dressed. Lance almost felt like a baby holding onto Hunk’s shoulders while he helped him get his legs through the pants. He was thankful he uniform’s pants were wide enough for him to wear the brace underneath, even if it was still bulky and awkward through the fabric. Better than going around with shorts, or, god forbid it, a pant leg cut above the knee. He shuddered at the thought.

“Dude, if you’re having such a bad time now, what are you going to do when it’s Keith helping you get dressed?”

“That’s not going to happen,” Lance snarled, letting go from one hand to zip his pants up. “I won’t allow it, and I doubt Keith would offer. And that’s not what was bothering me, anyway.”

It wasn’t entirely true, but he and Hunk trusted each other enough, and Hunk let it go. Not the first time they had seen each other’s ass.

Oh, god, was he going to have to see Keith’s ass? Lance wasn’t going to be able to look at his own ass in the mirror again. He’d seen what Keith’s looked in the uniform, and that had been bad enough already.

“Hunk, am I going to die?” Lance asked as Hunk set most of his clothes out in a neat pile on his bed. Or his ex-bed, as it were.

“That’s nonsense and you know it,” Hunk replied, not missing a beat. “Keith’s not that much of an asshole, and you still have me. We can sit together in class and during lunch and hang out, and we still have simulations together. I checked. You just have to tolerate being in each other’s space for half an hour every night and every morning.”

Lance let out a shaky breath. Somehow, Hunk had managed to pinpoint the sources of Lance’s anxiety before Lance himself could. He shouldn’t even be surprised at this point.

“...did you really check the simulation groups?”

“Yup. Engineers all go together, even if you change class that doesn’t mean they’d have to rearrange anything.” Hunk stuffed the clothes on a small suitcase. “What do you need from the bathroom the most? Do I get your whole set up?”

“Yes, please.”

 

* * *

Lance’s tablet had a notice saying he was excused from all classes that day, so when the time for Hunk’s evening lab rolled in, he rolled Lance back to Keith’s bedroom. It was going to take a while for Lance to see it as  _ their _ room.

To Lance’s relief, the place was empty. Keith was probably still in class. It dawned upon him he had no way to interrogate him about the painkillers now, but it was a sacrifice he was willing to make in exchange for some Keith-free time. Despite what Hunk had said, Lance knew he’d be spending way more time with Keith that he was happy thinking about.

He started setting his clothes into the empty drawers, but eventually, the pain was too much to bear, and he slowly dragged himself to bed. He managed to get off the wheelchair on his own, but folding it was way over his current possibilities. Instead, he just laid down, breathing slowly with his knee bent at the same angle as it had been on the wheelchair. The position was awkward and uncomfortable. 

Lance was just starting to psych himself up to start stretching it when his luck suddenly ran out.

Keith threw the door open and stared at him.

“You changed clothes.”

“Damn, I knew you were uncivilized, but I didn’t know a simple ‘good evening’ was past your possibilities,” Lance replied sarcastically, unhappy about being walked in by Keith in a stupid position again. It was too early for classes to be over, anyway. “...is that my pillow?”

If he’d been still high on painkillers, he would have said Keith blushed. Sadly, the painkillers had lost effect a long time ago, and allowed him to feel the pillow impact against his face in full force.

It wasn’t a lot of force, but it was the principle of the thing.

“Fucking hell, Keith, what’s wrong with you?!” He snapped, pushing himself up into a sitting position. “I didn’t-”

“Eh. It was an automatic reaction,” Keith replied, and it wasn't an apology but it almost sounded like one. “So. How was Hunk?”

Lance was a bit taken aback by Keith’s reaction, and it took him longer than usual to come up with a reply.

“He was fine. Apparently thought I was dead or something? But we’re good. Got me clothes and stuff.” He pointed at the partially empty suitcase by the end of the bed. “You know Hunk?”

“We’ve seen each other around,” Keith replied evasively, and kept standing in the middle of the room. He changed his weight from one foot to the other. “So. Do you need painkillers or something?”

“...actually yes. Do you have any?”

“Yeah, the nurse gave me some. Give me a second, I’ll get you a glass of water so you can swallow them.”

“Who are you and what have you done with Keith?” Lance muttered, not sure of what to do. He didn’t even have it in him to protest about Keith not giving him the painkillers earlier.

A minute later, Keith came back and set a glass of water by Lance’s bedside table, together with a bottle of pills.

“It’s one every six hours for a couple of days, then every eight hours,” he recited. “Also the nurse said to try get at least full eight hours of sleep, too. You also have an appointment tomorrow before lunch for check up.” He then moved to fold the wheelchair and set it against the wall. “You also have a pair of crutches, but you aren’t supposed to use them for now. So I’ll help you move around the room.”

“Are- yeah, thanks, I guess,” Lance muttered before downing the pill. He wondered how long it’d take to work. He glanced at the bottle. “This doesn’t even have a label. How did you even remember all that?”

“The nurse told me.”

“Right, of course, star student and all that.” Lance huffed, slowly lowering himself to rest onto his back. He wondered if he’d be lucky enough to pass out from the meds in the next thirty seconds. It didn’t seem likely, with the way his stomach was starting to growl. He was pretty sure he hadn’t eaten anything since the previous day’s lunch. Maybe it was time to test Keith’s suspicious helpfulness. “Can you bring me something from the mess hall? I’m starving.”

“I-” It was clear from the way Keith stammered that, despite whatever shady plans he might have in his head, he wasn't used to people asking him favors. “I guess I could?”

Lance didn’t bother to answer, just stared at Keith blankly from his spot on the bed. There seemed to be a struggle going inside him.

“What flavor do you want?” Keith ended up blurting out.

“Anything without pickles will do. I don’t think I can taste anything anyway.”

“Oh. Okay. Wait here, I’ll be right back.”

Lance suppressed the urge to snort. As if he could go anywhere else.

He ended up dozing off a bit, apparently, because Keith’s return startled him.

“Here’s your sandwich,” Keith offered, setting it on the bedside table. “It’s chicken.”

Lance struggled slightly to get up and reach it, and Keith didn’t offer to help. He returned to his desk, probably to work on his homework, but Lance could felt his eyes drifting towards Lance from time to time.

It dawned upon Lance that maybe the situation was as awkward for Keith as it was for Lance.

“I need to pee,” he said after finishing his sandwich, determined to not make it any easier for Keith.

“Um. Okay.” Keith got up from his chair fast enough that it was obvious he hadn’t been doing any homework. “Want me to help you?”

“No, I just thought you’d like to know.” Lance rolled his eyes. “Yes, sadly, I’d appreciate a hand here.”

“Alright.”

And it turned out that Lance wasn’t prepared for this. He’d never been this close to Keith in his life. Hunk was one thing, but being flush shoulder to hip against Keith, with his hand around Lance’s back holding him up, was a completely different feeling. Carrying Lance’s weight didn’t require any effort to him, and Lance found himself wishing he’d asked for two sandwiches instead of one.

He even smelled nice, the jerk. He’d obviously not spent the day crammed up with another fourteen geniuses in a tiny classroom.

“What, you want me to hold your dick too?” Keith asked. Before Lance could determine which answer would be the best option here, Keith released his hold under Lance’s arms. “I’m pretty sure you can manage for three seconds. Call me when you’re done and I’ll walk you back to bed.”

Lance leaned against the wall and considered flipping him off. He did need to pee, though.

“I’m not feeling the love here, Kogane,” he said flatly.

Even if he only had to share an hour total of his time alone with Keith, like Hunk had said, it was going to be a very long collection of hours.

Keith left him alone without bothering to reply, and after peeing Lance shuffled one legged to the counter. It was more tiring than he expected, his stiff back not letting him keep his balance properly. He didn’t want to call Keith back until he absolutely  _ had _ to, though.

He splashed some water on his face and checked his reflection in the mirror.

“ _ Fuck, _ ” he hissed.

His hair was an absolute mess from lying down all day. His face was an off yellow color and paler than usual, with dark circles that could easily beat Hunk’s by a mile. There was a brownish bruise staining his forehead and cheekbone.

No wonder Keith had called him pathetic. He wasn’t sure how he’d be able to look at him -or anyone- in the eye now.

After a weak attempt at setting his cowlicks down and washing his face again, he called Keith over. It was going to be a long night.

Fortunately -or not- it occurred to him on his way back that he had a  _ lot _ of catching up to do in his classes. Fighter pilots had two more classes than cargo class,  _ and  _ even the shared ones often had them doing different assignments. And, from what he’d heard, the simulations used a completely different system. Probably not much different from the one in the testing ship, but still.

He ignored Keith the moment he let him go next to the bed and managed to climb back up on his own. He was getting better at that, or maybe it was the painkillers starting to work their magic.

Right after he got himself all set up, he reached for his tablet and reread the announcement from that morning. He was excused from classes  _ today _ . So, not the next day. Just today. He was expected to attend every class. Great.

If he were with Hunk, he’d be freaking out right now. If his leg were fine, he’d be pacing up and down the room as he waited for the class files to download. As he was, however, he didn’t even dare to ask Keith if they had any assignment due soon. He was sure Keith would be able to smell his fear, and Lance did not need him having any more leverage.

“ _ Lance _ ,” Keith said a while later.

When Lance looked up at him, he realized the other boy had the expression of someone who had been trying to get his attention for a while. He’d changed into his pajamas, too. Lance hadn’t even noticed.

“What?”

“You need to go to sleep. The nurse said you need to get at least eight hours a night, preferably nine.”

Lance scowled at him.

“Like you give a damn. And anyway, this is more important,” he replied, turning back to look at the tablet. Being top of the cargo class ranking didn’t mean he could catch up with two new subjects in an hour. Specially when that made him bottom of the fighter class, now, and he couldn’t afford anything that would set him back even further.

“I’m sure,” Keith replied, his voice completely at odds with his words. “But you’ve been at it for two hours, so you’re already barely getting eight hours if you fall asleep right in this exact moment. Plus, I want to sleep, too. You haven’t even changed.”

“I can change by myself,” Lance protested -hoped- before checking that yes, Keith was right, and it had been two hours. Damn. He had to admit his time wasn’t being as productive as he’d thought. He was sure the meds were making him doze off at some points.

“Then do, but if you’re keeping the lights on I still can’t sleep.”

“Ugh, no wonder you didn’t have a roommate before me. Fine, I can’t study with your whining, anyway.” Lance set the tablet down and reached for his pajamas. He noticed Keith was still staring at him out of the corner of his eye. “A little privacy?”

Keith turned around and began passive aggressively to prepare his things for the following day, or whatever. Lance was too busy trying to figure out how to take off his pants with dignity and a bent leg.

It was easier to take them off than to put them on, at least, so he only needed like, ten minutes. Totally no time at all.

He was so fucked.

Keith finally got in bed, and the two stared at each other for a moment. Finally, Keith turned away sharply to face the wall. Lance sighed in relief. There was something incredibly eerie about seeing Keith in such a vulnerable,  _ normal _ state. Lance had always pinned him for some sort of cyborg. Sleeping in a pod at night. Living under the sole directive of being the best at everything and making everyone else eat his dust.

After a while, Lance managed to stretch his leg and adjust it into a comfortable position, or as comfortable as it was going to get. Keith hadn’t moved at all, so Lance figured out he was long asleep. Now, he just had to figure out how to calm down the anxious voices inside his chest and fall asleep in a strange room in a strange bed with Keith mere meters away from him.

It was easier said than done, which came as no surprise. Even with his internal clock thrown sideways, Lance guessed he had been staring at the ceiling for an hour at least.

That’s why he had been completely certain Keith had been asleep when he heard his voice from the other bed.

“I don’t think you’re pathetic.  Sorry .”

It was barely a murmur, and Lance wasn’t sure he’d made out the words correctly at all. Then he wasn’t sure there were any words to make out, and perhaps the meds were making him hallucinate. Because there was absolutely no way Keith had just apologized to him.

The other option was sleep talking. Keith was probably sleep apologizing after a sleep outburst on a cooler sleep roommate. Most certainly, yeah.

It was going to take Lance even longer to fall asleep now. Just his luck.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have a lot of soft content planned here I can't wait to write it all out. Also, I'm going to try and aim to update once a week or so!
> 
> Btw thank you so much for all the feedback you guys are fantastic


	4. Chapter 4

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the delay! I still plan to update once a week, but I spent last week abroad :S have some pining boys as compensation though :3

As things turned out, the painkillers didn’t last the whole night. Consciously, Lance had known this, or would have known if he’d spared a moment to think about it.

However, he didn’t, and he woke up feeling like someone had thrown him against a wall. Whatever the reason for that might be.

Turning his head slightly, he picked up his tablet and glanced at the glowing numbers. He didn’t have enough time to take more painkillers and go back to sleep, but it was too early to start getting ready for class.

It was, however, the perfect time to sulk about his life and how he’d ended like this. He sighed wearily and prepared to go back to reviewing the class topic of the day.

“Lance? Are you okay?”

The sound made Lance freeze up for a second until it came to him.

“Shit, Keith, why are you even awake?” he breathed out, turning to look at the other side of the room.

There was nothing to see. Everything was in complete darkness, the only light at the moment coming from the tablet in Lance’s hands. However, Lance would have recognized that drawl anywhere, even more so with the way sleep weighed Keith’s voice down.

“I heard you moving. I’m a light sleeper. And I guess I wasn’t sleeping all that well anyway, I wasn’t sure if you’d be able to rest. Seems I was right.”

Lance made a weak attempt at glaring.

“Well, you don't have to be worrying about that, I'll be fine.”

“I promised I'd help you.”

More rustling, and the light turned on.

“Wow, what happened to your hair?” Lance inquired, peeking up at Keith.

“Nothing,” Keith grumbled as a reply, trying to tame the wild strands down into some semblance of order. “Like you've never seen someone with bed hair.”

“Not like _that_ ,” Lance began to say. “How-”

“I _know_ you're trying to change topics. Tell me what hurts, if it's bad we should go back to medbay.”

“Oh, come on, it's nothing that bad. It only hurts when I breathe.”

“Yeah, that won't do for class.” Keith left his field of vision, returning a minute later with another glass of water and the pills. “Drink up, if it's still bad by the time class starts I'm taking you to the doctor.”

“Careful, Keith, I'm going to end up thinking that you care.”

Lance forced himself to sit up without help and took the painkillers. Like he would risk missing his first class over some bruised ribs.

Keith's wild hair and the face almost visible underneath didn't seem too convinced, but Lance didn't give him a chance to voice any objections. Instead, he pushed him away as soon as he finished drinking.

“Come on, I have a lot of studying to do, and you doubting my odds of surviving first period isn't going to help.” Lance huffed when he noticed Keith’s hesitance.

“Be my guest.”

Keith shrugged and turned away, walking to the bathroom. A minute later, Lance heard the shower start up. Well, it was an option to avoid confrontation. Lance shrugged and went back to his reading.

Just to stop soon after when he realized he was unable to concentrate. He couldn’t stop hearing the noise of the water in the background and Keith splashing around, or whatever it was he was doing. Instead of acting like white noise like usual when he heard someone shower, it was like the incessant ticking of a clock you can’t stop listening to. Keith was in the shower. And Lance’s brain wouldn’t let him forget it for a second. Whatever the reason for that might be.

The time for class couldn’t come soon enough.

Resigned, Lance set his reading aside and dragged himself to where his clothes lay, his brain still stuck on Keith. Keith, who somehow managed to pull off having ridiculous poofy hair first thing in the morning. It was too much to compete with during class already, but actually having to share his space with? Have him push the wheelchair? Lance's dignity wouldn't survive that.

"Keith, get out of there, I want to shower too!" He called out from the bed, trying to figure out whether or not he could get to the folded wheelchair without help.

A moment later Keith's head appeared through the door, his wet hair dripping on the floor.

"The nurse said you couldn't get the brace wet and to not remove it so soon. You can survive without a shower."

"No I can't," Lance protested, but Keith closed the door in his face, definitely putting end to Lance’s complaints. Mere seconds later, the sound of water came through the door.

It simply wasn't fair. Lance was going to show up to his first class looking like a car wreck while Keith seemed to have stepped out of some music video with water droplets running down his neck. It was a mental image -or an image, period- Lance could've gone without.

Resigned, he went back to his previous goal. Namely, to, at least, get dressed without Keith's help. It was tiring to sit upright, and much harder to pull his clothes off than on, but he eventually managed. A bit more wrinkled than his usual self, but he managed. The uniform's fabric was sturdy and, hopefully, wouldn't show much.

What he did not manage was the wheelchair. Before he could attempt to limp there, Keith came out of the bathroom. Fully dressed this time, which Lance was thankful for. He supposed.

"Oh, you dressed." Keith managed to make the words sound like a question more than a statement.

"Yeah, well, not all of us have a wild mullet to tend to." Lance glared between Keith and the wheelchair. Just two more minutes and he'd been on his way to class on his own. "Couldn't you take a bit longer?"

Keith frowned at Lance's words, but didn't rise to the bait.

"Wait, let me bring you the chair," he said instead, unfolding it in a couple of swift moves. He pushed it until it was in front of Lance. "Do you want me to help you sit?"

"No!" Lance snapped immediately, glaring at the wheelchair. Then he paused for a moment. He'd have to pivot on one leg to sit on the chair, and the armrests didn't look all that stable. "Actually, yes." He moved his glare up at Keith. "Just. Hold an arm out."

Keith obeyed wordlessly. Lance held onto his forearm as he hauled himself up from the bed. Carefully, he turned around and lowered himself down onto the chair. Keith's arm didn't shake in the slightest under Lance's weight. Gross.

"All set?"

"Drop it, Keith," Lance grumbled. "I'm going to roll myself down to class."

Keith eyed him critically. "I don't think it's one of those wheelchairs. You can't hold onto the wheels."

"Ugh." Lance let his head fall forward. "Are you sure I can't use the crutches?"

"Stop being so damn dramatic, Lance. It's not the end of the world." Apparently done with the discussion, Keith started pushing Lance's chair.

Lance resigned himself to his fate.

Class was a dull affair. No one in the fighter pilot class seemed to question Lance's presence there. Lance remembered they'd been informed the day before, but even Keith pushing his wheelchair failed to raise any eyebrows.

It did raise more eyebrows in the shared classes with the rest of the Garrison, but by then, he was swamped with fighter class reading and papers and couldn't afford to let himself be bothered by it. Keith set him towards the end of the class, not bothering to help him change seats. Instead, he just put one of the chairs out to let Lance use the table, and plopped himself down on the seat next to him.

They still didn't interact.

With how busy Lance was, he couldn't even bother to feel hurt by it.

The day continued in the same fashion until lunch time. The moment they got to the mess hall, Lance set his sights on the table Hunk and Pidge sat at.

"Keith, let's go that way. We're sitting with my team."

He didn't know if Keith wanted to sit with someone else, but he knew Hunk wouldn't mind. And besides, Keith had to take care of Lance's well-being, and not the other way around, right?

To his surprise, Keith drove him over without a complaint. Hunk immediately saw them and took over, helping Lance up with an arm under his shoulders, helping him sit down on the bench next to him.

"Um. I'll bring you the tray and go sit somewhere," Keith announced, standing next to the table watching the three of them.

"No way, there's still place for another person," Hunk replied before Lance had the chance to say anything. Which was a good thing, because Lance wasn't sure if he'd have said anything at all. "Come and eat with us."

Keith's immediate compliance made Lance suspect he didn't have plans to sit with anyone else, because he doubted it was the pleasure of his own company what made the other boy sit in front of him. Either he didn't care much for the friends Lance usually saw him with, or he was just that eager to gain brownie points with the Garrison. Which, being the number one super special genius pilot of Lance's generation, he couldn't need much of.

"Nice to meet you at last, Keith," Pidge said, offering a hand. "Lance talks so much about you."

"Zip it, Pidge," Lance huffed as the two shook hands. "Can't you change seats with Hunk or something? You're going to be a bad influence."

"Sheesh, Lance, what got into you today," Pidge complained, sitting back down.

"I have a lot of work to do. I want to eat fast so I can start writing this Monday's paper before our afternoon class."

Keith cursed and stood up suddenly. "Forgot the trays, I'll be right back."

"I'll help you," Hunk added, and with that Lance and Pidge were left alone.

"So... How's Keith?" Pidge grimaced at Lance's expression. "Come on, he doesn’t seem to be too bad. And we’re your friends, you can talk to us about it. I won’t press you, though."

Lance managed to relax his pout slightly before replying.

"He's... He's Keith, come on, Pidge. I could never be happy about this."

"That much is obvious."

"I'm serious! I didn't even get to shower, I’m a complete mess. And you should see what _he_ looks like after a shower. It’d make anyone question their self worth."

"Really? Is this the source of your big crisis? Keith taking a shower?"

Lance's glare deepened. "Not a word."

Pidge shrugged and went back to his food.

"Well, that aside, if you're having any issues with any classes... I could help, if you want me to."

"Wait, really?"

"Yeah, I mean, I don't have fighter stuff, but if you need notes or anything from the other classes... Hunk and I are still your team, right?"

Lance paused to take it all in. Then he beamed at Pidge.

"That'd be rad, Pidge. You're the best."

He offered a fist bump over the table, which Pidge reluctantly returned just as Keith and Hunk returned with two trays. Hunk slid his in front of Lance, and the conversation resumed. This time, it was about their calculus teacher and how soon would she go on maternity leave, and Lance eventually tuned it out. As much as he liked gossip, he had no issue with that teacher, and he was worried he'd end up having to deal with a worse one right at the end of the semester.

Feeling pressured again, Lance finished up his food without barely tasting it -not that there was a whole lot to taste- and set the tray aside to take out his reading. His friends let him be, and he managed to get through another two chapters when someone gently tapped him on the arm.

"Lance, next class is in ten minutes. We have just enough time to get there if we get going now."

Lance looked up to see the mess hall much emptier than the last time he'd checked. Keith was the only one left at their table.

"Where's everyone?" Lance asked him.

"They left already. They said they'd rather not bother you, since you were so busy." Keith replied, already standing up to unfold the wheelchair. "They told me to tell you not to stress yourself out, and that they'll see us tomorrow morning on the simulation."

"Ah, right," Lance managed to reply. He felt weird with the way everyone seemed to treat him like he was made of glass. "Why not this afternoon, though? I mean, we usually meet up a bit on our free time after class. I thought we'd study at the library together or something," he explained hurriedly at Keith's confused face.

Keith offered Lance his arm to get up and move to the chair as he replied.

"Oh, um, they didn't say anything. I think they're going to be busy, since Pidge is moving in with Hunk, and I mentioned you had a check up after class, so..."

"Oh, right. The check up." Lance paused. "Wait, Pidge is what?!"

"We were talking about it during lunch, didn't you hear?"

"Obviously I didn't hear anything that was said over lunch," Lance snapped. "Why-?"

"Eh... I thought you had talked with Hunk about it? I mean, since his room is half free now and... things..."

Keith trailed off, and Lance didn't reply. He didn't think much about it, but he'd been counting on moving back in with Hunk the moment he got better. The main reason he liked living at the Garrison, even through the stress and the pressure, was being able to have somewhere that felt like home. His friends felt like home. His shared room with Hunk did, as well.

Keith's room only felt like an exercise in survival. And even if he could admit Keith wasn't acting like an asshole like Lance had expected, that didn't mean he wouldn't later on. Even if he actually liked playing nurse, he'd eventually get tired, and Lance would have to deal with the fallout.

"Lance? Are you okay?"

"I'm fine," Lance huffed, glaring up at Keith. "You can start pushing, I'm not going to fall over."

"Okay, okay," Keith sighed. "Do you want to drop by Hunk's after the check up?"

"No, I'm good. I want to wash my hair or something before tomorrow, at least." Lance waited a couple of seconds until they got to an emptier corridor before adding, "thanks, though."

Keith's reply was just an unintelligible noise.

 

* * *

 

"What do you mean I can't ride the simulator? My arms work fine!"

"Sorry, kid, I don't make up the rules. You can't do any physical training, and the simulator counts." Iverson gave Lance a look as if asking him to test his authority. Next to Lance, Pidge and Hunk looked just as disheartened. "You two can join another pilot who doesn't mind having another go, but McClain has to wait outside."

"That's not-!"

"We're a team, we'll only fly when Lance can," Hunk stated firmly, putting a palm on Lance's shoulder reassuringly.

Lance sent him a grateful look, even if he was still dying to have a proper talk with him and Pidge.

"Then you can stand aside and watch. It'll be instructive anyway, especially since you've never done combat training."

"Of course, sir. Thank you, sir," Lance accepted meekly, knowing better than to test his precarious position any further. Pidge and Hunk muttered next to him in agreement.

They followed Iverson back into the training room. Keith had already gone inside the simulator with his team, and the rest of the class were piled around the screens showing the stats of the ship and the view on the inside. It seemed to be going as smoothly as it apparently always did. Iverson even felt comfortable enough to step outside, leaving the class unsupervised. Lance wished he was considered even a quarter as trustworthy.

Of course, the simulation ended with full points, and when Keith and his team stepped outside Iverson congratulated him for doing 'a good job, as usual'. Lance had only caught the end of the test, but he had to agree. Keith flew so smoothly, it looked like the environment adapted to him, and not the other way around.

Lance stopped paying attention then. He doubted seeing other people fly was going to be instructive enough to compensate for how much it was going to sour his mood.

When the next group walked inside after Keith's assessment, Lance closed his eyes and prepared himself to ignore the rest of the class.

"Hey, you doing okay?" Keith's voice asked him, suddenly way too close.

Lance jerked backwards, accidentally moving the chair. His ribs protested at the treatment, and he curled himself up, waving Keith away when he approached to hold onto the chair.

"I'm fine, everything's good."

"Okay."

Instead of walking back to the front of the group, Keith settled down next to him in silence. No one else had noticed the exchange, their words getting drowned out by the pilot's orders coming from the speakers.

Lance kept waiting for Keith to say anything, but at the end, he was the one to succumb to the pressure.

"Aren't you going back to your team?"

"No." Keith looked down at Lance and blinked as if surprised. "They don't need me to watch, and it's not like we're friends."

"You're not? I thought all the teams were friends."

"Yeah, well."

Keith looked around awkwardly, shuffling his weight between his feet. He seemed to be dying to find a way to switch topics. Lance almost took pity of him, but he was still too angry at having to miss the simulation to act charitable. Even if Keith was acting nice.

"Are you sure you're feeling fine? I'm sure Iverson won't mind if you skip the class," Keith finally continued.

Lance pondered his options for a minute before deciding that making Keith uncomfortable wasn't that high priority that day.

"Yeah, let's get out of here," he replied, giving in.

"Fine, give me a minute."

Lance watched Keith leave to talk to Iverson. It apparently didn’t take long to convince him, because he saw Iverson wave Keith off, and soon after he was back at Lance’s side.

“Want to head to the infirmary, then?” Keith asked him once they got to the corridor. Something in his tone of voice made Lance feel mocked, but it wasn’t strong enough for even Lance to worry about.

“Rude, no. Just head off anywhere, I already managed to organize my schedule enough. I don’t need to study every waking moment.”

“Alright.”

Keith started pushing the chair again. Lance still felt a bit annoyed by that, but he was feeling generous since Keith had gotten him out of the class, and didn’t comment on it.

He had to comment when he realized he had no idea where they were.

“Where are we going?”

“You said anywhere,” Keith replied, sounding vaguely amused. Lance quirked his brow at him, even though the angle was impossible. “We can access to the rooftop of the kitchen building here. Tons of storage boxes to sit on and lax security.”

Lance pondered Keith’s words for a moment.

“Fine, I guess. Lead the way.”

“I’m doing just that.”

“No need to rub it in,” Lance grumbled, leaning back. He was aching to get up from his chair, even if it was to move to a box. Anything would do. He used to get restless already if he had to sit for too long, and his knee only made things worse. The dull pain made him desperate to move.

The rooftop didn’t have any surprises waiting for them. It was big, and empty, with a decent view of the desert. The wooden boxes were pretty big, and seemed more than sturdy enough to carry a person’s weight. When Keith pushed him close enough to one, Lance stopped the chair -he might not be able to push it himself, but at least he had brakes- and pulled himself up holding onto one. It took some maneuvering to avoid hitting his knee or changing positions, but he managed to finally get on top of it on his own.

With a triumphant smile, even despite having to wheeze to catch his breath, Lance turned around to look at Keith. Keith was standing some steps away, with his face scrunched up slightly.

“What’s that face for?”

“Are you sure you’re not going to aggravate your injuries if you keep doing that kind of thing?”

It spoke volumes of Lance’s good mood that his reply to that was “I’m fine” instead of “none of your business”.

Keith left the wheelchair next to Lance’s box and went to sit on a box a bit further away, but close enough to talk. A comfortable atmosphere settled between the two as they stared out into the desert.

“You know, it looks much nicer like this,” Lance spoke, staring out into the horizon.

“What do you mean?”

“The desert. Blue sky, endless paths. It doesn’t look like a death trap from afar.”

“It’s not a death trap if you’re prepared for it,” Keith protested, apparently, on behalf of the desert. “People can live in it. This area is just a bit dry.”

“A bit dry? Understatement of the year.” Keith aimed a frown at Lance at those words, but it disappeared in front of Lance’s smile. “I guess you’re more used to it. I’m from the coast, though. It’s just weird to see no clouds for weeks, or no rain for months.”

“I guess.” Keith shrugged and went back to look at the terrain beyond the Garrison’s walls. “You’re right, I’m used to it. Do you like the rain?”

“Sure! Well,” Lance amended, “it’s nice if you have nothing to do. There’s nothing like staying at home watching the rain outside, or playing outside not caring what you will look like.”

He was surprised to hear a snort coming from Keith’s box, and turned around to look at the other boy’s profile.

“I can imagine you playing in the rain here and having to explain Iverson later why is your uniform soaked brown.”

“Hey, you’ll understand when you try it. Next time it rains, we’re going out, and I’m accepting no excuses. You’re Iverson’s favorite, he’ll forgive you, and I’ll say you kidnapped me.”

“Why? If I wanted to, I could just go play in the rain alone and leave you to watch me from inside the room.”

“You wouldn’t.”

“I could, though.” Keith glanced at him with a mischievous twinkle in his eye. “But I wouldn’t want to make you cry. Hunk would murder me. He told me so.”

“Did he now?” Lance muttered, distracted, and let the topic fall back into silence.

He had more important things in his head right now.

Like the fact that Keith, under the sun, a soft breeze playing with his hair and a small smile on his lips, was flat out _stunning_.

Lance had been perfectly aware that Keith was attractive beforehand. Being the Garrison’s top pilot, he would have had people batting their eyelashes at him in any case, but that aside, Keith was pretty in his own right. The _unfairly_ soft skin, the defined features, the immense eyes, Keith was a looker without even trying.

With a pout and slouching and under the cold artificial light of the Garrison.

Without any of those things, however, Lance simply had no chance of survival.

“Fuck,” he muttered, low enough that Keith didn’t even glance in his direction. He was thankful for that. His face was probably not the shade he wanted it to be right at that moment.

Keith seemed comfortable enough just being in silence, however. He kept looking out, not even giving Lance the vibe that he was being ignored.

And, meanwhile, Lance kept looking at Keith, trying to figure out what ancient desert deity had he angered to deserve his fate. Because he was sure he didn’t deserve to develop a crush on, probably, the most unreachable person in the whole Garrison.

Keith, who looked perfect all the time and wasn’t even as much of a jerk as Lance had made him to be in his head.

Keith, who had picked him up out of pity, and apologized afterwards for admitting it.

“Hey, by the way.” Keith’s voice pushed Lance out of his thoughts. “I’ve been wondering... how exactly did you get injured?”

Lance examined Keith’s face.

“Just... stuff. Does it really matter?” He said carefully. He’d told Hunk everything, but Hunk was his friend, and he trusted him. He couldn’t say the same for Keith, even if his hair looked like the cosmos Lance wanted to lose himself into.

“I guess not.” Keith was clearly going for nonchalant, but didn’t quite make it.

Lance guessed he was just as interested in gossips as everyone else in the Garrison. It got boring in there, and what was Lance but an inconvenient source of information?

 _Pero por Dios_ , he thought. _I could get lost in Keith’s eyes, and those same eyes barely see me as a person_.

The accident, the classes, it all was nothing in comparison with the mess Lance's heart managed to get him into.

After that realization, the silence between them was never as comfortable as it had been minutes ago.

And then, the bell rang, and the moment was over.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The giveaway for my other klance fic, Cross-steps, is still going on! Check it out [here](http://varevare.tumblr.com/post/158671870823/giveaway-time-so-i-decided-to-do-a-giveaway-for)!!
> 
> Also special thanks to sage and wintery for their feedback!
> 
> As usual, you can find me on tumblr @varevare and twitter @shiroganbatte


	5. Chapter 5

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which the sexual tension starts boiling over

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> My life's a mess, my dudes. A mess. Fingers crossed it'll get easier and that I'll start updating more often. Thanks for the comments and support i love u all
> 
> Special thanks to the ppl who helped me with this terribly troublesome chapter, it's finally here thank jesus

“Are you sure you’re going to be fine?”

“Yes, I’m  _ sure _ . Would it kill you to have a little bit of faith in me?” Lance complained, switching his weight between the crutches and his right leg. “The physio said I could start walking, like, two days ago.”

Keith squinted at him, his hands still hovering at Lance’s sides. They had been going back and forth for at least ten minutes, and Lance was starting to run out of patience. For almost a whole week, Keith had pushed Lance’s wheelchair to  _ every  _ single class. Maybe it hadn’t been as bad as Lance had been fearing, since most of their classmates seemed happy to ignore them both. Or perhaps they were too busy trying to keep their heads above water level before finals,  _ whatever _ . Lance himself had also been too busy to pay them any mind. However, he still wasn’t happy with having to depend on Keith for everything. Such as going to the toilet during class breaks. He’d barely enjoyed a couple of years of not having to ask the teacher for the bathroom pass, and now he had to ask Keith. Enough was enough.

“He said you could start moving around with the crutches  _ a bit _ , but that doesn’t mean you can spend the whole day moving just with them on your own.”

“I managed yesterday just fine getting around the room! And we’re going to spend hours sitting. It’s more than enough for me to rest between classes.”

“I still don’t think-”

“I happily do not  _ care  _ what you think.” Keith narrowed his eyes, but Lance didn’t allow himself to feel intimidated. “I’m going, and I’m going to be late if you keep being so... so  _ obtuse _ . You’re not going to be gaining many points if, instead of  _ aiding _ me, you sabotage my attempts to get to class on time. Teachers tend to frown at that. So step aside, Keith.”

Keith raised his hands further and took a couple of steps back, still looking unamused. “Fine. But don’t go around complaining later that I didn’t stop you.”

“Like I’d ever do that.”

Lance stared down at the couple of metres between him and the door. The class really wasn’t all that far away, but he was a bit worried about having to keep both his hands on the crutches. His left knee wasn’t supposed to carry much weight at all. And, for all the doctor had insisted the surgery had gone off without a hitch, his leg had an uncomfortable tendency to bend at the wrong times while doing some exercises.

He had to be honest with himself, even if he wasn’t being honest with Keith. Lance was  _ seriously  _ worried he wouldn’t be able to do the whole way to class on his own.

Still had to, of course.

“Can you open the door?” he requested, trying to act like it was no big deal.

Keith walked ahead and opened the door without a word, stepping outside the room. Lance almost tripped on his hurry to follow him, worried he’d close the door. Or just walk ahead to class and leave Lance to fend on his own.

As it turned out, Keith was waiting just next to the door, but that didn’t stop Lance from glaring at him before heading down the corridor.

The way to class had never seemed as long, and for some reason they seemed to be running into more people than usual. Lance was ready to take a break midway through, but that would be proving Keith right, and he couldn’t afford that. The other boy was still hovering next to him, only adding to the pressure in Lance’s mind. Not that Lance was about to admit it. If there was anything worse than showing Keith he had been right and that Lance couldn't walk there on his own, it was showing that he cared about what Keith might think. Keith could shove his opinion and suggestions inside that dark mess he called a hairdo. So instead, he kept his head straight and kept moving. One step after the other, and the way to the class had never seemed as long.

They eventually got there. Lance was almost surprised to see they had arrived on time. He'd completely lost track of time on their way. Carefully, he maneuvered to his table, and didn't even had the strength to snap at Keith when he brought him a chair. It was the first time Lance had actually gotten one in that class, since he'd never stepped there without being on a wheelchair. Keith still sat next to him, even though his work was, technically, done.

Lance sank into his seat letting out a big breath, and spent the minutes that were left until the teacher's arrival trying to figure a way to balance the crutches on the side of the table without taking up corridor space. After a couple of minutes, Keith grabbed one of them and demonstrated silently how to retract it to make it half the size.

Of course. No wonder Lance had never noticed them around the room before. He  _ really  _ wanted to snap at Keith for that, but before he had the chance to, the teacher arrived, making the class fall silent.

It wasn't a big difference from the previous classes. He was just sitting there and feeling restless, the brace around his knee itching the same as it had while on the wheelchair. His wrists ached slightly, due to the handles of the crutches being quite unforgiving. As high tech as the other equipment of the Garrison might be, the crutches looked downright ancient, despite their whole  _ collapsibility _ thingy, whatever it might be called.

Still, it was a relief to think he might be able to get up and walk to the toilet without having to request Keith's help.

Even if the walk to the toilet seemed daunting now.

The rest of the class passed by pleasantly, or as pleasantly as it might pass when, ten minutes before lunch, one of the teachers told them about a paper they had due next week.

A thirty page long paper on the latest advances on wing shapes for travel on different atmospheres, which was very much not Lance's area. He wasn't an engineer, and now, he wasn't even sharing rooms with one.

He was going to be cutting off sleep for that again.

It didn't stop him from showing off to his friends how he could now move without Keith's help. For some reason, Keith kept looking like he'd just sucked on a lemon whenever Lance made any mentions of it, but he didn't pay it any mind. He needed to cheer up with  _ something _ at least, right?

"Hey, by the way, Hunk, do you have any time later today?" Lance asked after he definitely sat down, elbowing the other on the ribs lightly. "We just got an assignment..."

"Nope, sorry, can't do." Hunk sighed and took a stop from his drink. "I have lab today, and you know how Ms Ochaya gets. It's gonna take all day."

"Aw, man." Lance rested his head on his palm, staring dejectedly into his cup of juice. "It's an aerodynamics one, you know how bad I am at those."

"We can work on it together."

Lance looked up, surprised to see Keith's determined face staring over the table.

"Um. Are you sure about that?" He wasn't trying to be mean, and their relationship hadn't been bad, but working on his homework  _ together _ with Keith was... still another level. He didn't consider himself to be Keith's enemy at this point. He was too busy trying to survive his classes -and he was happy to announce that, after Monday's calculus' test, he was no longer on the bottom of the scores. However, working together seemed much, much friendlier than Lance had assumed they were at this point.

"I am. I'm going to be starting this evening as well, and we're going to be together, right? Let's do that."

Lance raised an eyebrow, but he'd run out of possible answers. Keith immediately returned to his food, breaking eye contact, and when Lance turned at Hunk and Pidge, they were simply smiling slightly without saying anything.

"What? What are you guys staring at?"

"Nothing, nothing. I think it's a great idea," Hunk replied, and Pidge even giggled a little.

It didn't make Lance feel reassured whatsoever, but he guessed he'd have to go along with it.

Some hours later, Lance found himself awaiting eagerly the time to just  _ sit _ down on his comfortable room with Keith to start their paper.

Their classes had led them progressively further away from the dorm's building, and now that they were all done for the day, the way back was beyond daunting. Lance was certain his hair was drenched in sweat, and an annoying drop was slowly making his way towards his eyebrow. He couldn't even check, because if he let go from one of the crutches he was certain he'd collapse.

The corridors were empty, since they were in a rather remote corner of the Garrison, and everyone was dying to get away from the classes as soon as possible. Keith was the only one left besides Lance himself, and he was just leaning against the wall further ahead with a sour expression. Not precisely motivational, in Lance's opinion.

Just another step. He could make it.

Probably.

Hopefully.

Another step.

He lost his balance and his good side crashed against the wall.

Better than to the floor, he guessed, but it didn't make his pride feel any better.

"Alright, come on, that's enough." Keith approached him and held him steady with a hand around his back. It said a lot that Lance didn't elbow him even though he had a prime occasion to. "I should've brought the wheelchair along just in case, this is way too far from our room."

Lance would've hated to admit Keith was right, so he just kept silent and let Keith pry the crutches from his hands.

_ Pry _ in the most literal sense. His fingers were so tense around the handles that it took actual effort and pain to open them again to let Keith grab the crutches. When Keith finally took them, Lance turned to rest his back against the wall, still catching his breath.

"Are you okay?" Keith asked, trying to peek into Lance's face. His sour expression had disappeared, a worried one taking its place. It felt off, seeing Keith look at him like that.

"Do I look okay?" Lance snapped, the effect lessened by the small crack his voice did at the end of okay. "I'm beat. Can you bring the wheelchair here?"

Keith seemed to ponder it.

_ Don't make me say please _ , Lance begged in his mind.

"That'll take too long. Come here," Keith finally replied, gesturing at Lance with his hands.

Lance stared at him in disbelief.

"What?"

"I said come here." Keith repeated the  _ come hither _ gesture with his palms. "I can carry you back to the bedroom instead of making two trips."

Lance's eyebrows shot up at Earth escape velocity.

"You're kidding, right?  _ Carry _ me?"

"I'm not kidding." The return of the sour look was a minor relief at this point. "I can carry you just fine, the trip isn't  _ that _ long."

"But I don't want to be carried."

"Tough luck, big boy. You wanted to spend the day walking on your own, you don't get to get picky about the help you get offered at this point."

The staring contest between the two didn't last long. Lance wasn't even sure he ought to worry about his dignity anymore. He might not have any of that left.

"Fine." He extended his arms. "But if you drop me, fuck you."

"I won't," Keith replied dryly, putting his arm back around Lance's back.

The Earth suddenly shifted under Lance's feet, and before he knew, he was being held sideways between Keith's arms, and moving down the corridor.

Two were the main feelings in Lance's mind at this point.

First, that his mamá was right and he should be eating more. Keith had lifted him like he weighed nothing.

Second,

"Are you bridal carrying me?" he sputtered. "What the hell, dude?"

"You'd rather I carry you like a potato sack?"

“What? No! That’s no way to treat an injured person,” Lance protested, covering his face partly with his hands. Was he red? Oh god, his face was burning.

“Then don’t complain.”

Keith wasn’t even breaking into a sweat, or so it seemed from what Lance could see from between his fingers. If they weren’t in the circumstances they currently were, the hold would almost be comfortable. Almost.

“We’re never speaking about this again,” Lance replied, determined to have the last word.

He got it, because Keith ignored him. After that, Lance determined it might be a better use of his energy to pray they wouldn’t run into anyone on the way back.

Lance didn’t got what he wanted in that instance, but at least he didn’t recognize the handful of students they walked past. He figured that was good enough.

“Alright, I’m off to take a shower,” he announced the moment Keith set his feet down on the floor.

“A shower? I thought we agreed to work on the paper together.”

“Yeah, but we have to do research first, right? Not a lot we can help each other with at this point.” Lance shrugged, discreetly grabbing the crutches from Keith’s hands. “Plus, I won’t be able to concentrate on the paper unless I shower first, alright?”

Keith opened his mouth, but before he had time to voice any objections Lance started limping towards their shared bathroom. He felt much better after the break from the crutches, and managed to do so at a decent speed.

“I’ll be right back, nothing to worry about. Just get started with the research, or do whatever you want. I’m fine.”

He managed to slip through the door and close it before Keith could react.

Breathing out, he rested his back against the door. Lance was, in a word, tired, and not in the physical sense.

Well, in the physical sense too. The dull ache starting to show up in his arms was proof of that. However, that wasn't what was bothering him. It was starting to get strange to be around Keith.

Yes, he might have a minor crush on the guy. He'd realized that some days ago, and, even though he'd like to say otherwise, he had to admit it didn't even come as a surprise. However, even in that circumstance, Lance had thought he was safe. He and Keith had their dynamic down. They bickered and argued and were anything but friends.

Keith acting nice, not berating him (much) for insisting on the crutches, carrying him home? That was weird. And Lance wasn't in the mood to deal with it.

Carefully, he headed for the shower. Even with the knee, he was always comfortable there. His ribs barely ached, or so it seemed in comparison with the week before. That meant he could relax resting his back against the wall, the warm water easing his aches. The brace was a lighter model than the first one, and, apparently, waterproof. Lance wasn't about to argue it when the doctor changed it. It meant showers. And feeling clean and put together was  _ essential _ for his recovery, in Lance's humble opinion.

The crutches were still awkward to navigate with. The bathroom wasn't precisely handicap-ready, and even if it were, taking off his clothes on one leg would have been a pain regardless. So, of course, showers now took twice as long. And Lance had never been one to take short showers. He had a lot of products to use. Said products were currently taking over more than half the bathroom, thanks to Hunk's help.

It was really, really lucky Keith wasn't a stickler for hygiene, he never needed to use the bathroom while Lance was inside.

Lance suddenly had the idea that maybe, just maybe, Keith didn't want to rush him through his routine. His stomach felt weird, so he went to open the shower and try to drown out the noise of his thoughts.

He limped into the shower after leaning the crutches against a nearby spot he calculated he'd be able to reach even from inside the shower. Every contact his bad leg made with the floor made him hiss, but it was all worth it when he found himself inside the warm cubicle. With how dry the atmosphere around the Garrison was, even breathing seemed to come easier inside.

Perhaps he could get get a humidifier for the room. Say it was a medical necessity. He'd have to write it down when he came out, make sure he didn't forget about it.

He ended up dozing off after washing himself, just waiting for the hair mask to take effect properly. He wasn't sure how long he'd been inside, but the air inside the bathroom was foggy, steam completely covering the shower door. Shit, he still had that paper to work on. He couldn't waste time like this.

Lance threw the door open and jumped outside, trying to catch his crutches and the towel at the same time. Unsurprisingly, the maneuver didn't work, and everything fell to the floor, the crutches hitting apparently every piece of furniture on the way down in a loud crash.

Great. Now he was cold, wet, and had to navigate the bathroom on his own. So much for relaxing.

And since Lance's life was determined to show him just how bad things could get, the bathroom door was thrown open right then.

"Lance! Are you oka-"

Keith's voice seemed to fade, his eyes stuck to Lance's body. Lance's very naked body.

"Oh my God, Keith, get out!" Lance yelled, scrambling to grab a hand towel without slipping to cover his privates with. "It's- the crutches fell down!! You don't need to come barging in just for that!"

"I thought you had- the noise-" Keith blinked, for some reason not looking away yet. The steam inside was making him turn red. "You might have been injured! More, I mean! And the door wasn't locked, how was I supposed to know-"

Right. Lance had forgotten to lock the door because Keith never showed any interest to go inside, anyway, and he never minded with Hunk. But this was different.

_ Very _ different, with the way Keith's eyes still refused to move elsewhere. In Lance's opinion, he looked very good, thank you very much, but Keith was probably way more in shape, right? He could see how the other boy filled out his uniform. It was a nice sight. Not a nice thing to compare yourself to, though. Maybe he was judging Lance's (lack of a) workout regime. Or the bruises. They were getting much better, but maybe they were still gross if you had never seen them before?

"Can't you make yourself useful, at least?" Lance huffed, trying to cover as much as the hand towel would allow.

"What?"

"The crutches." Lance pointed at them with his chin. "The floor is still wet, I might slip for real."

"Oh. Yeah, sure, sorry," Keith replied, finally seeming to snap out of it.

He crouched to grab everything and handed it to Lance, completely avoiding eye contact with him now. Lance grabbed it, muttering a thank you, and Keith just nodded and left, his eyes stuck to the tiles this time.

Damn. Now he'd have to walk out there and face the guy.

Apparently he didn't need to, though. When he walked out of the bathroom, both fluffier and smoother, the only light in the room came from his own bedside table.

"Um. Keith?" He blinked slowly, his eyes trying to adapt to the darkness. "Are you there, dude?"

"Yeah," said a dark lump on Keith's bed. "Sorry, tired. You can stay up and research if you'd like. I'm going to sleep."

"Oh, okay," Lance replied, confused. Keith was many things, but he wasn't an early riser. "Nah, I'm good. It's a bit late, anyway."

He had no idea what time it was, but from Keith's small hum in reply he assumed he was right. Slowly, he turned off the bathroom light and headed to bed. He left the crutches nearby, and got in bed.

Also slowly. Because even getting in bed took ages when you have to manually maneuver your leg into the sheets.

"Well, goodnight. Let's go to the library tomorrow, work properly on it?"

"Sure. Goodnight."

Damn. Lance was no longer sure Keith had been acting friendly at all, with how curt his replies were. He tried to remind himself Keith had barged into the bathroom out of concern, probably, and not just to bother Lance. The crash had been loud. Keith had been startled after spending so long staring at articles on physics, as long as Lance was in the shower.

Lance was deep in those thoughts when sleep finally took him.

 

* * *

"Dude," Lance called out. He got no reaction from Keith. "Keith. You've been at that page for ten minutes."

"What?" Keith looked up at Lance, blinking slowly. "Oh. Yes. Did you need it?"

Lance pondered for a moment. "Nah, I still have a lot of material to look through." He shrugged and threw aside the magazine he'd been going through. "Not that it's helping. I mean, look at this. Completely demotivational."

He gestured at the piles of papers and books strewn around them, obtaining no reply from Keith. Lance sighed dejectedly and picked up a new article to read.

Neither of them were used to working with printed documents, and it showed. Practically everything in the Garrison was digitized. At least, their usual research topics were. However, their paper wanted them to include past research, which meant old sources. Sources that no one had bothered to digitalize, because who'd need outdated publications on aeronautics? It was completely useless.

Lance. Lance needed them. And so did the rest of the class. They had practically emptied that section of the library before the two of them arrived, although, despite everything, Lance still had enough documents that he struggled to hold them in a pile on his lap as Keith pushed.

Said documents were now being used to carpet their floor more than for their intended purpose. The dusty smell permeated the room, making Lance's nose itch. It was distracting. Keith, reading silently, was distracting. Or, at least, more interesting than the article Lance was reading, and wasn't that the same thing as far as procrastination was concerned?

"You're not even listening to me," he whined, flipping through diagrams without registering them. "You know, I'm sure we'd have more work done if we had stayed up late last night. Why did you go to sleep so early anyway?"

Lance could feel Keith became infinitesimally more still at that. He wasn't sure what it meant, though. When the two of them made eye contact, Keith had the expression of someone who just remembered they left the oven on. Guilt, fear, surprise...? It made Lance frown and try to lean closer, pushing himself with his arms over the floor.

"There's something you're not telling me, right?" Lance prodded him, peeking at Keith's face under his bangs. "Did you start the research after I fell asleep? Is there something you're not telling me? Are you hoarding something cool you found?"

"I'm not hiding anything!" was Keith's immediate protest, in the damning tone of a person with something to hide. "Why are you always expecting the worst from me? I've done nothing but try to help you all this time!"

Which, Lance had to admit, wasn't an entirely untrue statement. There wasn't a single thing Keith had done that Lance could accuse of being unhelpful or damaging. Things he'd said or thought, Lance didn't want to count. With his own mind helpfully supplying criticism, he knew he wasn't the best doing a reliable analysis of people's opinions on him. But as far as actions were, Keith had been... nice, really.

That was the rational interpretation, of course. But there was something about Keith's dark eyes and smooth face that made all of Lance's rationality jump out of the window.

"What else do you want me to do? You've been acting suspicious since last night. Even you being helpful is suspicious." Lance moved around Keith so that he was right in front of him. "Spill the beans, Keith."

"I have no beans to spill!" Keith pushed Lance backwards slightly, enough for him to lean away. "Listen, I need to write this paper, you need to write this paper. It's not going to write itself. We need to finish reading all this if we want to write it. So let's just-"

Keith ran his fingers through his hair in desperation, and Lance stopped listening. The piece of his mind that had been desperately trying to distract him from his paper jumped happily onto images of himself, running his fingers through Keith's hair. His brain wasn't going to go back to write that paper anytime soon.

"We're not progressing at all, though." Lance pushed the magazine in his hand against Keith's face. "Look at this. It's all nonsense. There's a sentence five lines long in here. For all we know, this is a test of mental fortitude, and not documentation skills."

"For all we know, giving up would mean failing said test anyway. So stop trying to distract  _ me _ , and either work on your paper or go bother someone else. I don't have time for this. I actually  _ care _ about finishing my homework, Lance."

Lance snorted. "Like hell you do. You're as bored as I am."

"Didn't say I was having fun."

"You can't say you're being productive either."

Keith groaned and dropped his hands to the floor, hitting the back of his head against the wall behind him.

"Fine. This is a waste of time. What do you want?" Keith replied, admitting defeat. Lance grinned.

"Entertain me. We're obviously stuck, let's get our minds off the paper for a while." He shrugged, smile still on his face. "Then we can go back to it fresh."

"You want me to  _ entertain _ you?" Keith interrupted him. "What do you want from me, Lance? I apologized for last night already!"

Lance's brain was apparently not only unable to read on ancient aeronautics, but also unable to process their conversation. Right there and then, it seemed to have skipped at least two whole minutes of talk.

"Last night? What are you-"

He didn't have an occasion to finish that sentence, because next he knew, he was being pulled forward, Keith was very close, and Lance couldn't breathe. His lips crashed against Keith's- Was it a kiss? Was a kiss really happening? Was Keith kissing him? Was he kissing Keith?

And as fast as it happened, it was over. Before Lance could reorient himself, he was being pushed backwards again. Keith stormed out of the room, slamming the door shut behind him with enough force to make the loose pages around Lance flutter the same way his lips did.

Taking a minute to catch his breath, he lied back on the floor.

"Well, fuck me."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can find me on tumblr @ varevare or twitter @ shiroganbatte


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> This chapter was very difficult but I hope it'll be _very_ enjoyable too :3c
> 
> Also oh damn we're over 200 kudos I'm so happy

Lance was pretty sure _that_ hadn't been his fault. Probably. He hadn't really done anything to Keith, had he? Other than freeze. It was blurry, and had happened really fast. It was, after all, a lot to take in.

Keith had kissed him.

Keith had _kissed him._

"Oh my god," Lance groaned, falling backwards. He wasn't going to survive the whole year sharing a room with Keith, that was for sure. "Why did he _do_ that?"

He said to the empty room, and got no response. Right. He had no one to talk about his problems, now. Hunk was rooming with Pidge, so...

Hunk was rooming with Pidge, but they were both his friends. Didn't that mean Lance could go to them? It wasn't like they had a fight, even if things had gotten a bit weird recently. They could really use some bonding, the three of them, even if it was discussing how damn weird Keith was.

Of course, Keith taking him there was out of the question. Lance was effectively stranded. Glaring at his crutches with resentment, he set himself in motion. If he couldn't visit his best friend on his own, just a couple corridors down from there, what kind of brave fighter pilot was he?

Slowly, he managed to push himself up from the bed. It would have been impossible just a handful of days ago, with the way his bruised arms and ribs were still aching, but Lance was unable to feel proud of his improvement. He was still little more than useless, and sitting still was never for him.

His slow advances seemed to take hours, even if he knew it couldn't have been any longer than ten, twenty minutes - and at last, he knocked on the door to his old room.

"Who is it?" Came Pidge's more high pitched voice through the door.

"It's me. Uh. Lance." Suddenly he wasn't sure if he was welcomed there or not. "Are you guys busy?"

The door finally opened, and Lance tried not to look too crestfallen when he realized only Pidge was inside.

"Come in. Where's Keith? Do you need help?" Pidge offered immediately.

"I'm fine, just need to sit," Lance replied, moving first towards his old bed but changing course towards one of the chairs. The bed was full of Pidge's papers, and it didn't feel his anymore. "Sorry, I didn't message or anything." He hadn't thought he might have to call ahead before going to his own room. It was weird to think it had ever felt like he belonged there.

"It's fine, you don't have to," Pidge answered, perching on the remaining chair. "What's up? You're all pale. Shouldn't Keith be helping you? Do you need me to call a doctor?"

"No no no, it's nothing like that!" Lance gestured too fast, accidentally letting one of the crutches fall to the hard wooden floor noisily. He flinched and left it there. "I just wanted to hang out for a bit, dunno. Do I have to be dying to drop by?"

He wasn't entirely able to keep the bitterness out of his tone, and he saw Pidge grimace at it.

"Come on, Lance. You know that's not how I meant that."

Lance didn't reply, staring at a spot on the floor.

"I do owe you an explanation," Pidge finally continued, seeing as Lance had no intent to answer. "I didn't mean to take your place or anything when I asked to move in with Hunk, I was just desperate to switch rooms."

Lance looked up.

"Wait, what? You were?" He peered at Pidge's face, confused. "You never told me anything. Did Hunk know?"

"He didn't know anything until I asked him if I could move in, and even then I didn't tell him much. Just that it was important. He knows now, but, yeah." Pidge looked a bit apologetical. "I'd have told you too, but we haven't precisely seen each other much. And the mess hall really isn't the best place for... Anyway. You know how I asked you and Hunk to call me Pidge instead of, um, Katie?"

"...yes? What's that got to do with anything?"

"I'm not comfortable with being called Katie. Or with being called a girl in general, and everything that goes with it. But I don't want to be a boy either." Lance nodded, and Pidge continued. "Well, my roommate really, _really_ wanted me to be a girl. She wanted us to be BFFs, and to do a makeover on me, and paint each other's nails, and gossip about cute boys, and she'd call me Katy and try to get me to wear my hair more cute..." Pidge trailed off.

"Oh. Damn." Lance winced a bit. "Yeah, doesn't sound like a lot of fun for you. I mean, I know you. And she wouldn't listen?"

"Ugh, no. She cried once because she thought the problem was that I didn't like her." Pidge sighed. "We were incompatible. It was getting bad. But you got injured, and changed rooms, and... yeah. I know you wanted to stay with Hunk, I can ask to get changed again when you get better. I'm sure I won’t end up with be the same person again, perhaps it won’t be awkward or weird this time."

"No, no." Lance shook his head. "I'm doing fine, you deserve a place you're comfortable in, too. I'll manage, don't worry. I'm glad you're doing well now."

Pidge finally smiled at that.

"Thanks, Lance. You're the best." They jumped off the bed and walked over to Lance's side. "Can I hug you? Or are your ribs still..."

"My ribs are doing awesome, just like me. Come here," Lance replied, motioning them closer. Even sitting down as he was, Pidge was barely half a head taller than him, so it wasn't as uncomfortable as it might have been otherwise. And Lance liked hugs. He didn't realize how much he had been needing one.

When they eventually broke apart, Pidge looked more relieved than Lance had seen them in weeks.

"So, what brings you to our humble abode? You can come whenever, of course, but you seemed to be in a hurry. Anything you need to talk about?"

 _Yeah I'm here to talk about cute boys_ , Lance didn't say. Shit. Pidge had just listed it as one of their reasons to change rooms. And after the talk, his worries just sounded like nonsense compared to Pidge's. It wasn't like Keith was throwing tantrums because Lance didn't act like he wanted. He was being okay. He kissed Lance, sure, weird. Except that maybe it was a cultural thing. Definitely nothing worth bothering anyone with.

"Nah, I just wanted to drop by. That aerodynamics paper is making me crazy. Please help me."

Pidge snorted. "You know I suck at those. Hunk's probably coming back soon, wanna stick around and ask him?"

Lance didn't need to think it twice.

"Yeah, definitely sticking around. You'll have to bear with me for a little longer."

If he had to go back to the room to spend the rest of the day waiting for Keith, he'd go crazy.

 

* * *

 

Turns out avoiding things ended up making you even more anxious about them. Who would've thought. Not Lance. He had nothing to do with anxiety. Fuck that.

Hunk and Pidge had walked him back to his room, talking about anything but Lance's paper or Keith's weirdness. The conversation flew more easily than before, now that there was no remaining tension between them, and it had been a long while since the three hung out alone. They hadn't even been at the simulator training together, which sucked, but the two of them had reassured Lance he was still their favorite pilot. With a bit of luck, they would be back at those in a week or two more. At least, that was Hunk's official estimation when they reached Lance's door.

Lance opened it without thinking, juggling the crutches with more ease, and found himself face to face with his roommate.

Literally. Keith was right on the other side of the door, apparently about to open it himself. Lance squeaked when he found himself uncomfortably close to the other's face.

"Oh my god what the f-" "I just heard the voices I was going to check if you had-" They said at the same time.

"Um, guys?" Hunk's voice came from behind Lance.

"We're fine! Don't worry," Lance replied immediately, twisting sharply to look at his friend with a guilty expression. "I'm alright now, we should keep working on our paper for a bit."

"Yeah, we should," Keith agreed, finally stepping back to allow Lance to walk in. "Hi, Pidge, Hunk," he added stiffly.

"Alright. See you tomorrow then, guys," Pidge said, their glasses reflecting the light weirdly.

That was the last thing Lance saw before the door slid shut.

Neither Keith nor him spoke for a moment.

"So. The paper. Yeah," Keith finally said, turning away towards the books that no longer littered the floor, instead piled up by their desks. "We haven't done that much today, we should try get something done before going to sleep."

Lance nodded, slowly making his way to the bed. _So we're not talking about this, huh._ "Alright, can you pass me some materials? I want to put my leg up, I've had it bent all day."

"Yeah, sure."

Lance sat down and removed his shoes, watching the other boy.

Keith moved carefully, apparently trying not to step on any eggshells. Maybe he was tired. It was late. Did Keith ever behave like that when he was tired? Lance couldn't remember. He was no longer sure if any single of his opinions about Keith, up to date, made any sense.

He'd never thought of Keith as a careful person. Sure, he was graceful alright, but in the effortless way a panther might be. Part of the reason he always seemed so smooth was how little he cared about everyone else's opinion of him. He was elegant not despite not caring, but partly because he didn't care. Even when helping Lance move around, he'd never seemed personally worried about it.

Not like he was acting now, stepping around the room like Lance was about to throw a crutch at his head.

Was he expecting Lance to? It was such a weird thought. Maybe Keith thought Lance was mad at him.

Lance wasn't sure whether to be mad or not. Hell, he didn't even know what made Keith do what he did. Was it to shut him up? Was it a joke? Was it a desperate love confession? Each and every one of these conjectures seemed more unlikely than the last.

And Lance was, once again, not working on his paper.

Minutes ticked by as the two of them stared blankly at their screens. Keith was glancing at Lance from time to time. And every time, Lance caught him, making Keith return his gaze back down immediately. It was a ridiculous way to interact, if Lance could say so himself. Frustrated, he leaned his head back, hitting the wall. Keith jumped on his seat. Any other time, Lance would've taken advantage of the situation to tease him a little, but as they were, he didn't even enjoy getting under Keith's skin.

They were at a stalemate.

He went back to his paper, determined to _not_ look at Keith this time. He was certain Keith was still glancing at him. He felt his stare as a pressure increasing around his neck and shoulders.

After a while, he finished the synopsis and first page, stubbornly refusing to look at the time to see how long it had taken him. With his head full of so many things, he attempted to switch his posture, pressing on his bad knee accidentally. Immediately, he screamed. The pain wasn't as bad as the surprise factor, making him let his tablet fall to the floor and clutch around his brace with both hands.

Lance'd never had any delusions about his mental capacities - Advanced Calculus I had almost killed him - but it was particularly frustrating at that time. Keith, the paper, his injuries. He could only keep track of two.

His injuries had demanded attention, and Keith had slipped below the radar for long enough to appear holding Lance's shoulders.

"Are you okay? Did you twist anything? Do you need to go to med bay?"

Breathing between his teeth, Lance shook his head.

"I'm fine, I'm fine. Didn't expect it, is all." When Keith failed to move anywhere or release him, he tried to shake his hands off. "I just moved it weird, it's not that bad. Just need a minute to catch my breath."

When he raised his head back up, Keith was, once again, way too close. It was the second time that day that Lance had been close enough to count his eyelashes, but the first time he actually had the time to. He inhaled sharply, and that finally seemed to shake Keith off his stupor.

"Alright, fine." Keith moved away, breaking eye contact with Lance as he did. "Try to be more mindful of your leg, you've been straining it enough. You should get in bed properly, rest it on some pillows, or... something like that."

"Can't, I'll fall asleep, and I had just started to be productive for once. I'll rest better if I can get at least halfway through the assignment."

"Yeah, alright."

Huh. It _definitely_ wasn't like Keith to not criticize Lance's choices about his health. Not that Lance was about to complain, but Keith always seemed ready to argue that he knew better. At least, insofar as Lance's health was related concerned.

Which was weird. It sounded weird now. Maybe Lance was the one who was making things weird between the two, overthinking everything.

"Can I sit with you?"

Lance stared at Keith, his eyes wide. "Sit with me? Where?" That was the wrong question, he should have asked _why_.

"On your bed. There's enough space, can I sit there?"

"I guess?" And that was the wrong answer, but before Lance could correct himself, Keith climbed next to him.

Lance gaped at him, unable to react. Keith wasn't sitting too close, but it was still close enough for Lance to feel the warmth radiating off him.

"Are you trying to boycott me?" He finally asked Keith.

"What are you talking about?" Keith replied, having the gall to look surprised. "I'm just working on my paper."

"Yeah, of course," Lance grumbled, attempting - and failing - to go back to his paper. If Keith wasn't actively trying to distract him, he had no idea what else he could be trying to do. And if he was, it was working. "It's because I told you I was finally being productive, isn't it?"

"Ehh yeah, I thought maybe some of it would rub off onto me." Keith's voice went barely above a mutter. Lance still heard him, because they were sitting _that_ close.

He was about to go crazy.

Minutes kept passing by, and Lance's paper kept advancing slowly.

He flipped through one of the books Keith had set on the bed, hoping to fit any extra info to add to his current paragraph, when he noticed Keith's intent stare out of the corner of his eye. Lance turned towards him with a start.

"What?" He asked. Keith blinked and didn't reply.

The staring contest continued for a couple of heartbeats, and Lance grew more and more nervous.

"Well? When are you going to kiss me again?"

He had asked wrong. _Again_ . Asking _when_ made him sound like he was expecting it to happen. He _wasn't_.

Hoping, perhaps, but he wouldn't admit it even under duress.

"I was just waiting for you to finish with that book," Keith finally answered, and Lance wanted to _die_. "But I can kiss you now, too. If you don't mind."

Lance was, in fact, about to die.

"What kind of way to ask is that? ‘If I don't mind’?" Lance set the book on the bed away from Keith’s reach. "That's absolutely no reason to kiss someone. You can't go around kissing people willy-nilly just because you're the coolest kid in town or something like that."

"That's not the reason I kissed you!" Keith pushed, straightening up and turning his body towards Lance.

"Oh, so there's a reason? I'd like to hear it!" Lance pushed back.

"Your mouth looked nice, and I wanted to see what it felt like."

Keith's cheeks were finally red, thanks to Lance. If only he was in a position to enjoy it.

"...and what did it feel like?" he asked Keith, because he was on a roll of asking the wrong questions tonight.

"Nice. Like I thought it would."

"Ah." Lance noticed how close Keith was, and his lips looked plush and soft from up close. He also noticed Keith's eyes darting downwards for a moment as well. "So do you want to try it again?"

"Yeah."

"Alright why no- oh."

Lance glanced down at Keith's lips again. The left corner twitched, like he was trying not to laugh at him, and well. Lance couldn't have that.

He leaned down to catch Keith's lips against his, and in the hurry, he crashed both their noses together.

Well, that didn't work as well as he'd hoped. Keith started snickering at him while he readjusted the angle, and when they finally started kissing properly, they had to stop a couple of times because Keith couldn't help but to smile and snicker some more. Lance wished he could get mad at him and push him off, but instead, the sound only caused a fluttery feeling inside his stomach, so he kept going until Keith was finally more interested in making out rather than laughing at Lance's clumsiness.

It took a while until they found a proper rhythm, but it was all worth it when they finally reached it. Lance wondered how his life had gotten to this point, and he found himself not caring to figure it out. He could have been floating in space for all that mattered. His world was reduced to Keith's warm body against his and his lips brushing against his own. They were raspy but plush, complete opposite to Lance's own, and he soon learned that he could elicit soft gasps from the other boy if he caught them between his teeth, so he set himself to use that knowledge to his advantage.

An undetermined amount of time later, they broke apart to catch their breaths, Keith resting his head on the crook of Lance's neck while he leaned back against the wall.

"We should do this more often," Keith muttered against Lance's neck, his voice carrying a breathlessness Lance hadn't heard in it before. Keith's hands - calloused, to match his lips - had gotten under the rim of his shirt at some point and were brushing against the skin on Lance's waist. It was hard to pay attention to anything else. "I mean, if you're okay with it. Though you seemed to be okay with it just now. I um, I mean-" the voice wavered and trailed off.

"Yeah, alright. Let's uh." Lance took a deep breath, hoping his voice wouldn't betray him. "Let's do it again sometime. Not like we lack the time, I guess. Since we're here. Often. Not that we have to do it often."

"Yeah, we have to work on our papers and everything," Keith replied, pushing back just enough to look at Lance in the eye.

"Yeah, of course."

"Yeah." Both paused. "So is that a yes?"

"Uh, of course?" Lance nodded twice. "Yes, let's do this more often."

"Awesome." Keith beamed at him. Were his eyes a bit purple?

Damn, Lance was so weak for this boy.

"...maybe we should continue the paper now. You know, before it's time to sleep," Lance finally suggested, barely managing to shake himself out of it.

"Ah, right, sure." Keith finally moved away from Lance, reaching for his own tablet and turning it on to check the time. "It's- oh, shit. It's been like fifty minutes, we better get to work."

“Damn, already?” Lance rushed to grab his own. It was true. He tried not to think about what it meant spending almost an hour kissing Keith.

His brain was really, really far away from the paper’s topic right at that moment. However, he still had to pull it off, so he took ten seconds to compose himself and went right back to it.

Neither said anything when Keith sat back next to him. And if their bodies ended pressed next to each other it wasn’t clear who was to blame.

It was hard to think with Keith so close. The paper, at least, was mindless, so after some minutes Lance found himself sinking back into the topic. It worked well enough to avoid thinking about his personal life.

It stopped working when he yawned and Keith suggested they call it a night.

Lance barely avoided asking Keith to sit back next to him again, and he watched helplessly as the books and magazines were taken from his bed and set back on their desks. Way too soon, they said goodnight to each other, Lance managing to change and maneuver into his bed seemingly faster than usual, and the lights went off. Perhaps it went fast because he’d been dreading it, because lying on his back in the dark, there was nothing Lance could do to avoid remembering what happened that day.

Keith had kissed him, and he’d kissed Keith, and they spent ages making out.

And Keith might want to do it again.

And Lance was unable to think any further than replaying their kisses over and over in his head until he fell asleep.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The rating might be rising soon. Not yet, but soon. *rubs hands together*
> 
> Thanks a lot for all the comments guys I love every single one!!!
> 
> You can message me whenever at **varevare** on tumblr or **@shiroganbatte** on twitter!


	7. Chapter 7

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Keith wants to go for a ride.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> :3c

> “The lift on the wing can be found using a three-dimensional form of the Kutta-Joukowsky theorem, specifically,  _ L = ρV _ ∞ Γ _ b.  _ Combining this with the results from part D, find the lift slope (i.e.  _ dC _ _ L _ _ / dα _ _ ∞ _ ) for a wing with  _ AR  _ = 10.”

Keith stared at the question. He knew the answer, or at least, he thought he knew enough about the topic to guess some sort of an answer. Get halfway there, or something.

However, his brain refused to cooperate, still stuck replaying Lance's voice when he sighed Keith's name during last night's makeout session.

Yeah, Kutta-Joukowsky took a definite backseat in his brain to that.

Ever since he'd first kissed Lance, it had become a regular occurrence, or as regular as three days could make it. They'd work on their homework, and somehow, always end pressed against each other and exchanging spit. It had soon become Keith's favorite way to spend time.

And now, it also was the reason he was staring at his paper blankly.

"Ten minutes left, everyone!" the teacher yelled, her shrill voice racking Keith's brain. Around him, a couple of classmates twitched, and everyone seemed to increase activity somehow.

Keith glanced to the side to check how Lance was doing. Save for a lanky leg thumping the floor incessantly -the non injured one, clearly- he seemed to be completely immersed in the test. Keith grinned, feeling the competitive streak Lance often tried to push at, and went back to his exam. There was no way he was going to do worse than him.

Ten minutes later, the teacher plucked the paper out of his hands -old fashioned, she was- among a number of protests between the students. Keith had left the last question halfway done, but there was nothing to be done about it anymore. Instead, he got up the moment the teacher went back to her table, and walked up at Lance.

"Hey, dude. Are you okay?" he asked, bending over Lance's slouching form. "Let's go get lunch, come on."

The only answer was a low groan. It didn't alarm him. It wasn't the first time he'd seen people like that after an exam, and it wouldn't be the last.

"Come on, I think we're having nuggets today. I don't want to get there late."

"You and your nuggets," Lance huffed, but there was a smile tugging at the cheek Keith had on view. He sat up straight and pushed himself up carefully while Keith handed him his crutches. "I don't know how can you be so cheery after this. I don't even want to ask how it was for you. Surprise test the same day we turn in a paper? Total massacre."

"I guess it could've been better," Keith replied with a casual shrug. He glanced around the classroom. Lance was right -he wasn't the only one with seemingly no will to make it to the mess hall. "I'm happy regardless, though," he added as he walked out.

Lance followed him swiftly. He was getting much better with the crutches, his left leg apparently being more reliable as well. Keith found himself walking at practically his normal speed as they made their way down the corridors.

"And why is that? I don't think I can be happy until I'm sure I didn't fail horribly."

"We're done with our paper, so..." he bit his lip, trying to repress a smile. "We'll have a lot of free time this afternoon."

He didn't dare to look at Lance for a moment, but just a couple seconds later he was rewarded with a high pitched squeak.

"Dude!" Lance huffed, pushing against Keith with his shoulder. When Keith glanced over, he noticed his ears were much redder than usual. "You can't just  _ say _ that, anyone could hear!"

"I only said we'd have more free time after finishing the paper. I don't know what are you talking about," Keith insisted, the smile tugging against his cheeks finally defeating his willpower.

"You're impossible," Lance complained, pushing against him again more softly. "But I'd like to go out for a bit. We've spent too long locked up in our room. You think we can get to the rooftop again?"

"Sure, if you want to."

Lance gave him a sharp nod, and his ears stayed red all the way to the mess hall.

"But really, that test was  _ shit." _

"Oh well, nothing to do about it now," Keith replied.

He opened the door first, checking to see the rooftop was empty. It was, as usual. If anyone wanted to take a breath of fresh air -or at fresh as it got in the desert- they could just walk outside. Watch some planes. Whatever. It was out of the question for Lance, even if the other boy would never agree to it. Keith saw him wince whenever they had to walk long, but he hadn't wanted to suggest the wheelchair. Lance looked completely miserable in it.

And even though it wasn't any of Keith's business, god, he didn't want him to look like that.

"Oh, come on, the least you could do is talk about it with me," Lance insisted, sitting down next to Keith. He was getting more agile with the crutches, Keith had to give him that. "Seriously, I managed to finish it, but I want to go over a couple of the answers."

Keith shrugged, looking out at the horizon. It was a bit colder than usual, but still just as empty as he’d gotten used to. Not even a drone making the rounds. He had nothing better to do than discuss the exam, then. Not as long as Lance was a jittery mess of nerves. Not a good mood to make out in.

He wasn’t surprised though. Lance had been in the cargo pilot section for a reason, surely. Keith saw how much he struggled with the classes, and if he gave a damn about rankings Keith might have been miffed about it. He didn’t, though. He just hoped he wouldn’t end up being asked to be Lance’s tutor, too.

"Fine, whatever, sure," he finally gave in. “What’s the issue?”

“You know the lift coefficient problem? Calculating from the individual elements? Well, I’m not sure how to tell if the coefficients of the parts are representative of the pressure distribution in the whole airfoil. I don’t know if we were meant to check for that, I was running out of time so I just calculated it as if, but I’m worried now because I don’t even know if we were supposed to do that or not.”

Keith blinked at Lance, his brain taking a second to catch up.

“That’s... not the type of question I expected you to ask,” he spoke, his brain to mouth filter not working the best in front of Lance’s puppy eyes. “I um. Yeah I didn’t check for that either.”

Lance breathed out sharply. “Thank Jesus. Seriously, dude, it’s like the moment we handed it in the idea appeared in my head and I just-”

Keith watched him rant for a couple of minutes, his brain zoning out between questions. Lance seemed to be keeping up with his classes just fine. Of course, even if he got there with outsider influence, he’d obviously managed to keep his spot, even if it was through a crazy amount of hard work. Keith knew his teachers wouldn’t accept it otherwise, and Lance had received no favorable treatment at any point as far as he could see, other than simply getting promoted to fighter pilot class.

“Hey, Lance, what spot were you at before moving into our class?” he finally asked when Lance seemed to run out of energy and things to worry about.

“What? Dude, I was number one, of course!” Lance gasped, pushing Keith’s shoulder. “I was right behind you in a lot of shared classes, how can you not remember?”

“Sorry, I never paid any attention to the rankings,” Keith admitted, embarrassed. Not that his embarrassment came from his lack of attention to the rankings, of course. He’d been rooming together for  _ months _ now, hadn’t he?

“Yeah, well, guess that sounds like you alright.” Lance seemed to deflate again, clearly having spent a lot of energy on his rant. “You’re always top of the class. Makes sense you wouldn’t care.”

“I  _ do _ care about my studies!” Keith protested. “I want to be a pilot more than anything in this world.”

“But any type of pilot will do, right? You don’t need to be at the top. You just are.”

“That’s not true, not for me.” He crossed his arms. Lance fell silent next to him, giving him space to talk, and it was almost worse than if he had been pressuring Keith. He didn’t like talking about himself. It was like listening to a recording of his own voice, except instead of his voice, it was his life what stopped to make sense once it was out in the wild, outside Keith’s own body. “I need to... You know Shiro?”

Lance snorted. Well, that wasn’t the best reaction Keith had hoped for.

“Oh, come on.  _ Everyone _ knows Shiro. Dude’s my hero. What about him?”

“I didn’t have the best home environment,” Keith tried to explain, then stopped. He wanted his explanation to make sense and have a background, but that didn’t warrant his full life story. Lance sure as hell hadn’t signed up for that. “I was pretty lost in high school, in general. I didn’t know what I want to do. Then I met Shiro at an army recruitment event. He was really popular, of course. The smile, the voice, the way he can make anyone feel like they matter... everyone wanted to talk to him. But he talked to me. Listened to my dumb rants about the school and the system and shared his dreams with me. I wanted to be like him. I want to be able to work  _ with _ him, explore space, find what the universe has in store for us. And since he’s the best pilot in the Garrison, that means I need to be the best pilot, as well.”

Lance didn’t reply for a moment, enough for Keith’s palms to start sweating.  _ He thinks it’s stupid, I must have sounded like an idiot, he’s going to mock me for it. _

“Wow. You must really like Shiro, huh? That sounds seriously amazing.” Lance’s voice might have wavered at Shiro’s name, but Keith couldn’t tell whether it was his own anxiety or not. “I’m sure if someone can make it, that’s you. I can’t imagine anyone else being good enough to go neck and neck with him.”

Immediately, the weight was lifted from Keith’s shoulders. He muttered a  _ thank you _ . It went unanswered.

The two stared out at the horizon together for another minute. It was companionable, somehow. It was surprising for Keith to find someone he didn’t get drained spending time with.

Lance  _ could _ be draining as hell, of course, but he seemed to have quiet moments too. Quiet moments that most people probably never saw, and it made something weird twist in Keith’s stomach when he thought he was one of the rare witnesses for them. Lance’s sharp profile against the blue sky was serene, a sharp contrast with his usually bubbly nature. Could be called beautiful, certainly, in the sense that it made Keith really want to kiss him.

He’d spent a lot of time thinking about kissing Lance as of late.

“Shit, we should get going, it’s past one already. Did we miss the bell?” Lance suddenly gasped, having checked the time. “Come on, we’re gonna miss the nuggets.”

“Do you even like nuggets that much?” Keith asked him, already walking to hold the door open for Lance.

“It’s not about the nuggets, it’s about the prestige, come on!”

They got to the mess hall before Lance could successfully explain to Keith the prestige on eating a coveted meal. Keith was becoming an expert at balancing a tray in each hand, even though it made Lance’s mouth turn every time Keith picked up his. It didn’t take them too long to get to their table, all in all. Hunk and Pidge were already there, and Lance wasted no time wrapping himself over the surface that was left free to retell the tale of the awful surprise exam moments after turning in their paper from hell.

It was different, very different from the quiet calm they had shared some minutes earlier, but Keith didn’t mind it. Lance was entertaining to watch. He was full of life, in every sense of the world, and it'd be hard to not smile when he wanted you to.

"You're being weird today," Pidge suddenly said from their spot next to Keith.

Keith jumped, accidentally splashing some water down his chest, but no one else seemed to notice. Pidge had spoken in a soft voice, and Lance was taking all of Hunk's attention by babbling about their exam. They were both deep in their conversation, and Keith could barely believe he hadn't noticed how on top of their classes the two of them were until that morning.

"What do you mean?" he asked Pidge, trying to dry off his jacket with the paper napkin in his tray. The Garrison might be top tech, but they still only got one napkin per person. "Do I look tired or something? I didn't sleep much."

"Maybe, I don't know. You're like, softer." Pidge glanced at him before going back to their meal. They still were talking too low for the others to notice, which Keith was grateful for. "You're usually pretty tense."

If Keith wasn't sweating before he was now.

"I just, um. I'm not used to sitting with people during lunch."

"I know. You're a loner. I need my space too, I understand. But I'm not sure that's what this is," Pidge insisted, leaning a bit closer. "It's something about your aura."

Keith snorted.

"Oh my god, Pidge, are you talking about auras?" Lance stepped in, apparently attracted to the flashiest words in any conversation. "Please, don't try to sell Keith that New Age mumbo jumbo. I thought we were all people of  _ science _ here."

"Hey, there's a lot of scientifical research about it! It's not my fault you can't step outside the path of unoriginality. Sometimes you need to see beyond and think outside the box, even our  _ teachers _ tell us those are important skills!" Pidge replied, pointing at Lance with their plastic fork threateningly. They had seemingly forgotten the conversation between Keith and them from a moment ago, which Keith was thankful for. "I can redirect you to you tons of literature backing it."

"Oh no, I have no space for any fiction within all my non fiction reading list."

"You little-"

It wasn't until the mess hall workers kicked them out that the conversation finally died off. Hunk called it bickering, Lance and Pidge defended it as a heated debate, Keith didn't say anything in fear Pidge would put him and his social awkwardness on the spotlight again. It hadn't been as bad as usual, though. Sitting with people every lunch break had been a break from the usual pace for him. He let the trio walk ahead of him, though. As long as Lance didn't need him to move around, Keith wasn't needed there.

After so many years, it barely stung anymore.

Short after they arrived to the dorms section and their paths separated. Pidge said they had some undefined research to do, while Hunk had promised to facetime with his mom. The moment they disappeared behind a corner, Lance let out a breath and leaned against Keith.

"Man, do you think we can sit down here for a second? I'm beat."

Keith's stomach did  _ something _ at the proximity. It was a strange feeling he didn't have time to examine as he put his arm around Lance's waist to held him up.

"Why didn't you slow down? We've been going pretty fast; I'm sure they'd have stopped if you needed a break."

"I hate worrying them. Hunk already feels guilty about the accident to begin with. He's still saying he should've stopped me, even when I tell him I don't regret it. I don't want them to think about it any more than strictly required."

Keith huffed.

"Your friends' comfort isn't more important than your health. Can you sit on the floor?"

"Dude. These pants are white, don't be nasty."

Lance attempted to elbow Keith in the ribs, but in their current position he only succeeded on losing his balance when his knee went down. Keith managed to stop him before he fell down, and he ended up supporting Lance's full weight.

"You have like a dozen, come on. Or should I just carry you all the way back?"

"No  _ way _ , what if we run into Vanessa or Irina? I can't be seen with a black butt or getting bridal carried," Lance replied without making any attempt to move away from Keith.

"Ugh." Keith didn't push Lance off, but he considered it. "You're so fucking shallow, Lance. You'd rather get more swelling than lose street cred in front of a girl?"

"No, it's because they're total gossips and I don't want them to tell the whole Garrison. Highschool was hard enough already, I learned my lesson. Why, are you jealous?"

"What, no, whatever, I don't know anything about them," Keith snapped, taking the crutches away from Lance with one hand and picking him up like a potato sack with the other.

This immediately elicited shrieking and kicking from Lance. Not that it mattered. Getting back somewhere safe was the topmost priority on Keith's mind right now. Somewhere where Lance won't interrogate him about jealousy in the middle of a public corridor.

And Lance was laughing as Keith started running, anyway.

"Keith, you're a complete madman," was the first thing Lance said once Keith put him down. He was still smiling, cheeks flushed as he leaned against the wall. "I can't believe you did that. Did you see the janitor's face?"

"It's your own fault, you took too much to decide," Keith replied, returning the crutches so Lance could get to the bed.

"Nah. You got flustered, I know it." Lance sat on the bed with a self satisfied smile and started the long maneuvering to take off his boots. Keith's offers to help with that matter were never well received, so he just sat next to him. "Is it Irina, then? I told you I don't like her, she's sorta mean."

"I don't like her either. I mean, I don't hate her, but I don't care for her opinion. Why would I? We've never talked."

"Yeah, fair enough," Lance replied, punctuating the sentence by throwing a boot across the room. "Still, she's lovely. With her face she could be a model."

"I don't care. Your face is good too." Keith internally winced at that sentence. It sounded better before he said it out loud.

It seemed to have the desired effect, though, because Lance failed to argue it. He just looked at Keith, his mouth moving slightly but without saying any words and his face growing redder by seconds.

So Keith did the only thing he could think of and kissed him.

Kissing Lance felt every time like the first time he piloted a ship. It was too fast for his brain to keep up, confusing and stressful and it made Keith feel more alive than anything else in the world could. He wanted more, and more, and Lance was determined to beat him to it. He pulled Keith down on top of him.

And down Keith went, breaking the kiss just to avoid crashing his nose against Lance. Lance put his arms around Keith's neck and pulled him into another kiss again, nipping his lips in a way that made him shiver.

His hands found their way under Lance's uniform jacket, pulling it open between kisses and the shirt under up. Lance's body was as soft and warm as his mouth, and Keith hadn't expected this to be a reason he'd be happy his ribs were healing properly but life was full of surprises. Fantastic ones, like the noise Lance made when Keith reached for a nipple.

"Fuck," Keith muttered against Lance's lips, and moved down from there to his torso. Lance didn't complain, just watched Keith with his eyes open wide as the other traced the lines of his stomach reverently. "You look amazing."

“Do you really need to narrate it?” Lance muttered, partly hiding his face with his hand. “There’s still bruises.”

“You look  _ amazing _ . Let me suck your dick.”

Lance stared at him.

“That’s... that’s a bit gay.”

“I’m gay. And we’ve been making out daily.”

“Oh. Okay.” Lance looked away from where Keith laid, hovering over his spread legs. “I mean, I have nothing against it. I’m just, um. Making sure. That you knew.”

Keith glanced down but stopped halfway to Lance’s crotch.

“Huh. Your chest blushes too.”

“Keith!” Lance yelped, pushing Keith’s face away with one hand as he tried to pull down his shirt with the other. “Are you just trying to tease me?”

“No, I’m trying to suck your dick,” Keith said, his smile pressed against Lance’s palm. Lance could be adorable at times, even if he’d hate to hear it. “Is that okay?”

Lance watched him for a second longer, then dropped his hands, using them to pull himself up a bit. Keith resisted the urge to touch him.

“Alright, yeah. You can.”

"Awesome," Keith replied with a smile before getting down to undo Lance's pants. "I'm alright with teasing you, though. You make cute faces."

"Oh my god I'm going to kill you."

"You know, that's not very encouraging if you want your dick sucked," Keith replied, laughter threatening to bubble up in his throat.

Tentatively, he grabed the bulge under Lance's pants, and whatever retort Lance was preparing disappeared. Instead, he fell back down on the mattress, his arms seemingly giving up on holding his weight.

"Alright, nevermind, you're going to kill me first," came Lance's muffled voice. Keith peeked up. The angle wasn't the best to stare at Lance's flushed face.

He really was too cute. Keith considered offering him a pillow to help him lean up, but he doubted his suggestion would be well received if he told Lance his reasons.

"Do you always babble this much during blowjobs?" he asked, his fingers barely brushing the edge of Lance's underwear. The shiver he got in response was pretty satisfying.

"Do you always judge the people you're sucking off so much?"

"I'm not judging," Keith huffed, pressing a kiss against Lance's bare hip. "Or complaining. Just wondered about it?"

"You've been wondering what I was like during blowjobs?"

When Keith looked up again, his eyes met Lance's. Open wide on his flushed face. Except this time, Keith was blushing too.

"Oh, shut up," he ended up snapping before pulling Lance's underwear down a bit too roughly. He peeked down. "Nice," he breathed out.

A weak laugh told him Lance had heard him. Or at least felt Keith's breath on his dick. It was a nice dick, perfect size, symmetrical, smooth -Lance was  _ really  _ thorough with his beauty routine. Keith figured he'd be able to ride it no problem if Lance just laid on his back like he was now, bad leg or not. He hoped he'd convince Lance at some point to do so, as well.

For the time being, though, he just wanted it in his mouth. No distractions. Even if the distraction was a flustered Lance considering Keith's ass in the near future.

Holding it with his right hand and using the other as leverage, Keith leaned down until he could reach the tip with his tongue.

"Ah, Keith-" Lance muttered weakly, shivering under Keith's hands.

Keith decided this was his new favorite activity in the whole world.

Slowly he bent lower, alternatively licking and sucking following Lance's reactions -a shiver, a moan, a hair tentatively brushing Keith's bangs away. After a while, Lance started to gain confidence and mutter encouragement and praise. Each word made Keith shiver, feeding the warmth in his chest. His mouth felt too small for the task, despite all the fervor he was putting into it. The combination of his own spit and Lance’s salty, slick precome made the sucking both interesting and a complete mess. It just got wetter and wetter as he went, his mouth open wide and yet unable to take Lance whole. Keith felt like a complete mess, and yet, from the weak sounds coming from Lance, it seemed his efforts were being appreciated.

By the time Lance managed to look at Keith again, Keith's cheeks were so red that he was the one who didn't dare glance up. He compensated by getting Lance's dick farther down his waiting throat until Lance's moans went from half coherent phrases to empty gasps mixed with Keith's name and random Spanish.

When Lance tugged at his hair, his voice going higher in warning, Keith refused to move away. He knew what he was getting into.

Alright, he didn’t, but he wanted to think he hid it well enough. At least, up to the point when Lance’s warm load hit him with full force on the throat. His eyes teared up and some threatened to spill on the covers. However, it was all worth it when he sat up and showed Lance his empty mouth.

“Madre de dios, te lo has- Keith- oh my God,” Lance squeaked. His eyes were glossy, lips swollen, hair sticking up everywhere. Keith couldn’t imagine he himself looked any better, yet, definitely, he himself was nowhere near as attractive as Lance did right now.

Keith swallowed again, the flavor still sticking to his tongue. At least it didn’t taste as bad as the internet had led him to believe it would. He smiled.

“No complaints now, huh?” he rasped out. Damn, it had been tougher on his throat than he’d thought. Couldn’t be helped, his voice’s wellbeing had been the last thing in his mind at the time.

“Nope. Too late. I’m dead.” Lance laid back down. “Wait, no, sorry, are you still hard? Let me help out.”

Keith's cheeks burned at the thought. For some reason, the idea of Lance touching him seemed much more intimate than having Lance’s dick inside his mouth. Being under his control, letting Lance see him come undone... alright, there was Keith's reason. He always had a time giving up any control.

“Don't worry, I'll take care of it,” he muttered under his breath, avoiding eye contact even as he laid down next to the other boy.

Lance didn't protest it, still catching his breath, and Keith managed to bring himself to completion while watching Lance's long eyelashes and flushed face. He looked gorgeous like this, his eyes closed, skin soft against Keith's side.

Not that Keith planned to tell him. Lance didn't need to have that over Keith. 

If Lance jumped to conclusions when Keith went back to kissing him right after he got off, well, that couldn't be helped.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's finally happening \o/ I'm sorry this update took so long! The chapters keep getting longer :'( but I hope the contents make up for it!!
> 
> Special thanks to Ezra and Wintery for their love and support! Also everyone feel free to hit me up whenever on tumblr (varevare) or twitter (@shiroganbatte) even if it's just to ask about updates I love every comment :')


	8. Chapter 8

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Lance overthinks and Keith thirsts

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry for the long wait, I hope this update is worth it! It's 5k it got out of my hands x_x

The room barely deserved the name of “theater” their classmates used to describe it. It was obvious whatever giant budget the Garrison had wasn’t being spent on good screens. But the room was big and with plenty of seats, so it was the place they all gathered when there was any announcement to be made.

Lance was usually more hyped up about it, because it meant time to gossip with his friends and not stuck in class.

Today, though- today it meant nothing to distract him from remembering the warmth of Keith’s body, lying next to him on his tiny bed. It had been uncomfortable, with Keith somehow managing to sleep like a brick all night while Lance’s good leg went numb.

Keith had looked at peace. Lance had never seen him make that face before. Soft and relaxed with sleep. Relaxed enough to sleep in Lance’s presence while his lips were still red from- what he’d done earlier. Or just not seeing Lance as a threat, not that Lance could blame him. He didn’t feel very threatening himself. Not with the way his heart seemed to flutter every time Keith pressed his lips against Lance’s own.

It was simply inappropriate to be choked up in strange feelings for the boy next to him while the Garrison’s secretary gave a speech about the Kerberos mission. Lance wanted peace and quiet and self reflection, not a guy two rows ahead distracting him by making spitballs as if highschool had never ended.

“Are you alright?” Keith muttered next to him, leaning closer to make it a private thing, an exchange just for the two.

And Lance just wanted to know if he meant anything by it.

“Yeah, I’m good. Just wondering how long are they planning to keep us in he-”

Before he could finish the sentence, the big screen across them turned on and everyone started squealing in excitement, drowning him out.

It was a blessing in disguise. Stopped Lance from blurting out anything stupid before his brain finished waking up.

Something such as  _ I want to wake up next to you every day from now on _ , or the so. 

Nonsense, really. 

Lance glanced at the screen.

“Is that Pidge?” he asked Keith, squinting at the camera. He could have just asked Pidge, but they were two rows ahead. Lance was still stuck sitting on the last row every time because of his crutches. Needed the extra space. Still.

“No, that’s Matt, he’s on the Kerberos mission with Shiro. They’ve been friends for years.” Keith gave him a weird look. “How come you’ve never noticed him?”

Lance shrugged. “I don’t know, I guess Shiro always took up the screen. Or I assumed that was Pidge all along. Why do they look the same, anyway?”

“They’re siblings.”

“Oh.” Lance didn’t know how respond to that, and returned his attention to the screen. This was weird. He felt weird. Keith probably thought he was weird now.

Not that he cared about Keith’s opinion of him.

Oh, who was he kidding. It was much too late for that.

On the screen, Matt was doing some sort of vlog about the mission. Lance wished he was in the right frame of mind to pay attention to it, because it seemed interesting. Not  _ hot fighter pilot  _ interesting, but more than most of his regular classes for sure. He just wished Shiro would show up a bit- ah, there he was. He walked over to where Matt was, and the other scooted over so they’d both fit in the screen. There was a minor increase in activity in the classroom, and someone squealed a bit, but the teachers didn’t call them out of it. It seemed understandable, Shiro’s shy smile and square jaw were what teenage wet dreams were made of.

Lance rested his chin on his hand, glancing at Keith simply out of reflex. The other was sitting straighter than before, his eyes not straying from the screen. His eyes shone in a way Lance hadn’t noticed before.

What had Keith said about Shiro exactly? Lance wasn’t all that sure, his mind a fury of thoughts. It wasn’t like he even needed to know. Lance becoming a fighter pilot was nothing short of a miracle, and Shiro had the hearts of half the people in the room right now. It was no contest that, if he had to choose, Keith wouldn’t hold Lance all that high in his list of priorities as he held Shiro.

_ And he’s going to choose _ , Lance remembered with a start. Keith and Shiro were close, weren’t they? Shiro had always seemed so far from Lance, more so with Kerberos out there. He hadn’t ever thought he’d compete with Shiro for anything, busy as he was trying to keep up with Keith. Much less that he’d have to consider competing for Keith’s attention.

Because Lance was self aware enough to know that he wanted said attention, now.

“Fuck,” he muttered softly. It was drowned by the video’s audio.

It didn’t feel dramatic enough, so he allowed his body to slid down on his seat as much as he could without forcing his outstretched leg. Keith turned his head to regard him curiously, but went back to the screen immediately once he assessed that Lance wasn’t really falling down.

Lance hoped it wasn’t predicting already how his struggle against Shiro would go.

* * *

 

_ The bed had felt cramped earlier in the morning. _

_ When he woke up, it took Lance a second to remember where he was. Warmer than he remembered his Garrison room to be, and with less space to wiggle. He opened his eyes slightly, but saw nothing but nondescript white sheets. When he moved to sit up, though, the sharp twinge of pain spreading from his knee sent everything rushing back. _

_ The crash, the hospital, the Keith. _

_ Keith kissing him. Keith asking to suck him off. Keith’s hair tickling against spots in Lance’s body Lance never thought he’d get anywhere close to. _

_ He thought he ought to be panicking, but the warmth and leftover endorphins swimming though his body had a sedating effect on him. His alarm hadn’t gone off yet. He wasn’t sure why had he woken up, but Keith stayed blissfully asleep next to him, breathing in and out slowly. _

_ Readjusting his position, Lance turned to watch the other fully. His cheek was smushed against Lance’s pillow, and his hair was everywhere. It was rather cute. _

_ Keith’s mouth, soft with sleep and a darker shade than the rest of his skin, got him reminiscing. Half dozing as he was, Lance wasn’t even sure that had actually happened. Perhaps it was just a weird, pain meds induced dream. _

_ But Keith was still in bed with Lance, and he’d stopped taking any pain meds over a month ago. _

_ It seemed like too much work for his brain to catch up. Instead, it just seemed to bypass any thought process entirely. _

_ Lance pressed his lips against Keith’s. _

_ Keith made a soft noise, his eyelids fluttering open. It took a second for his eyes to focus on Lance, but when they did, the corner of his mouth twitched, hinting at a smile. It pulled Lance’s heartstrings and spun them around like sugar. _

_ “Ew, morning breath,” Keith greeted him, his tone as soft as the rest of him. Lance covered his mouth with a hand. _

_ “Not like you’re much better,” Lance grumbled, and was rewarded by a soft kiss to his open palm. And it was spun sugar all over again. _

_ Of course, that’s the moment his alarm chose to start screeching, crashing the glow around them. Because that was Lance’s life. _

* * *

 

After the video ended, they walked together to the study room. It was a free hour and there was no urgent work to do, with most of the Garrison about to leave to spend their holidays with their family.

Lance wasn’t one of them, and, seemingly, neither was Keith, but they hadn’t discussed it.

Hunk and Pidge, however, were, and Lance had been unable to say no when they asked Keith and him to hang out together. He tried not to overthink about what it meant that Keith had agreed so readily. Lance would have wanted to spend some time with Keith, himself. At the very least, alone to organize his own thoughts. Neither were possible with Pidge’s incessant chatter, and Lance even found himself smiling against his will at the way their face lit up when talking about Matt. He understood missing your siblings alright.

Keith was just silent and sullen. It was hard to tell whether it was worse than usual, but damn if it didn’t feel like it.

“So when are you guys coming back here? The Garrison is gonna feel empty as hell next week.” He glanced between Hunk and Pidge when there was a break in the conversation. He’d been playing with a ball of paper to cover his frazzled nerves, and now he couldn’t even remember what it had been. Nothing important, he hoped. He rolled it on the table between his hands.

“Ah, true, you guys are staying, right?” Hunk looked between them curiously. Keith didn’t acknowledge it. “Man, you gotta tell your mom.”

“I don’t know what are you talking about, of course she knows I’m not going,” Lance dodged, still moving the tiny ball around.

“Hello, Earth to Lance? The leg?” Pidge rolled their eyes. “Come on, man, I know you like, super promised not to tell, but I think you could’ve come up with an excuse by now.”

“Nah, guys, are you crazy? You don’t know my mom. She’d fly here on the next plane.” Lance shook his head stubbornly. “She doesn’t need to know. Doctor said it’d be fine before summer break, anyway.”

Hunk snorted. “Yeah, right, the Garrison also said the test drive would be safe, and yet, here you are.”

Pidge shut him up with a well aimed elbow to the ribs, but Lance’s mind was already swirling with panic at the thought. He was getting better, wasn’t he? His leg would be fine in no time. It was true it had been a while, his wrists unable to recover from the crutches between one day and the other, but he’d be fine in the summer. For sure. Earlier, even. He needed to take the tests in the simulator to pass, after all. What would be the point of everything if, after all his effort, he lost his spot in the fighter class because he couldn’t take a stupid test?

“Shit, sorry guys. I just remembered we had reserved the laundry for today.”

It was Keith who had spoken, rising to his feet.

“Huh?” Lance’s mind wasn’t quite where it should be, it seemed. He couldn’t remember laundry. He couldn’t remember his own birthday, probably. He glanced at the crushed ball in his left hand. “Ah, okay. Guess we better go, then.”

“Yeah, sorry to cut it short.” Keith handed Lance his crutches. “See you at lunch.”

“Ah, today we have lab, so we’ll probably just grab a sandwich,” Hunk replied apologetically, standing up as well. “But there’s still some days before we leave, we have a lot of time to talk, no worries.”

Lance nodded. “Alright, see you around, man. You too, Pidge.”

Pidge only nodded. Lance could see their eyes straight on his back as he walked away towards where Keith was holding the door open for him. Keith’s eyes, however, did not met Lance’s, and he walked ahead at a brisk enough pace to make Lance break a sweat in order to follow.

“Hey, man. Keith. Wait,” he panted, catching up at last when the other paused in front of the elevator. “What’s the hurry?”

Keith shrugged. “There’s no hurry. I just don’t want anyone else to take our spot.”

“Chill, it’s not like people are dying to do laundry. Everyone will rush the day before leaving, you know how it is.”

Lance finally felt himself relax when the doors closed in front of them.

Keith was staring at him.

"What is it?" Lance asked, suddenly self conscious.

"Nothing. You doing okay, right?" Keith continued after Lance failed to reply. "I mean, with your leg and all."

"Yeah, of course. Where did this come from?" Lance could feel his hands sweating against the crutches, and this time, it wasn't from the effort to hold onto the handle. "Is this your roundabout way of asking if I'm feeling energetic enough for another go?"

Keith raised his eyebrow, but he couldn't fool Lance. His skin was much too pale to hide the blushing.

"That's not what I meant. You were making a sorta weird face, that's all. And before you jump at that, I don't mean that your face is weird. It's a good face."

_ A good face _ was probably the mildest, less enthusiastic compliment Lance had ever gotten. It was also the first real, actual compliment he'd received from Keith, though. And, tragic as it was, Lance didn't have a haircut long enough to even attempt to hide it.

Looking away was his only choice, and even then, he could heard the smile on Keith's voice when he spoke next:

"Are you  _ embarrassed _ ?" It was as close to delight as one could get.

The doors opening saved Lance from replying, and he pushed past the people waiting to get on with all the speed his overwhelmed brain could manage. The corridor was, thankfully, blissfully, busy, everyone wanting to make the most out of their free hour, laundry or not, and so the conversation was dropped.

Until they reached the laundry room, of course. Lance didn't realize until he was right in front of the washing machine that he didn't actually have the laundry. That dumbass, Keith, should have stopped him. He'd probably gone to the room straight ahead to pick their bag, ignoring Lance's furious escape completely.

Rude.

He sighed and turned around, ready to walk back, just to see Keith closing the door behind him. No laundry.

"Keith, dude, what are you-" and Keith's lips were on his.

He would have lost his balance if Keith hadn't been right there, with his hands getting personally acquainted with Lance's ass as he hoisted him up and pushed him onto the washing machine. Lance had been, consciously, aware that Keith was able to lift him. It wasn't even the first time he'd done so. It  _ was _ the first time he noticed how much it turned him on, though. He melted against Keith's mouth, letting the crutches fall off to rest his arms around Keith's shoulders.

He wasn't sure how long they spent like that, barely parting to breathe with their soft sighs and pants muffled by the machines around them. It wasn't until Keith rested his head on Lance's shoulder that he found his words again.

"Are you on your tiptoes right now?" were the words, because his brain had melted with the rest of him. The only response he received was a groan against his neck. He took it as confirmation. "Alright, nevermind. What is this for? No complaints, it just seems random. Didn't we have laundry to do?" He gasped. "Did you make up the laundry excuse?"

"Maybe?" Keith said weakly, pressing a kiss against Lance's jaw. "I mean. Can you blame me? I meant what I said, your face is good." There was a pause. "And I really like it when it's blushing. ‘Specially when I'm the one making you blush. Glad to learn I don't need to suck your dick every time for that."

Lance groaned and pushed him away. "Dude! You can't just say that!" He was red again, he knew it, and Keith was pressing his smile against the palm of his hand. "Next time just tell me you want to make out."

"Okay. Lance, let's make out."

Like there was more than one answer possible.

* * *

 

The rest of the classes of the day were lackluster. Everyone, teachers and students alike, were distracted after hearing from the Kerberos mission, no doubt daydreaming about being someday featured like that. Lance was, too. In five years from now, he'd certainly have strong shoulders, a sexy stubble, and girls asking for his autograph as he descended from his spaceship.

The girls were sorta Keith shaped. And there weren't a lot of them. Alright, it was just Keith, grabbing his hand and pressing it against his face as he leaned close to kiss Lance. Whatever.

It was hard to concentrate when Keith was blatantly down to make out with you, okay? At least, that's what he told himself when his gaze kept drifting to the seat next to his. Keith didn't look back, but the corner of his mouth twitched every time Lance stared for too long. Lance wanted to kiss it.

All entirely normal, of course.

He'd kept thinking of how the rest of the day would go, after their last class. He doubted Keith was going to be thinking of studying, and he wasn't either, but his mind couldn't conjure any images other than flashbacks to kisses in the laundry room. It made a shiver climb up his spine.

They managed to behave normally in public, though. No one had walked into the laundry, and they weren't about to start kissing in the corridor.

Lance wasn't sure of the reason, just that they wouldn't. Keith being down for kissing doesn't mean Keith being down for other people knowing he kissed Lance on the reg- Too complicated.

Keith walked next to him as they left the class, waiting for him to grab his crutches but no longer helping him up like he used to. It didn't mean much, Lance  _ was _ getting better at them. What was he going to do, hold his hand-slash-crutch?

He knew Hunk would tell him they needed to talk about what they were doing. Sit Keith down and go  _ what are we? _ , which was the exact reason Lance didn't want Hunk to know. And if he didn't tell Hunk, he wouldn't be telling anyone, so he was alright with Keith acting like he barely remember Lance's name as they made their way back to their room. No talking and more kissing was a plan Lance could get behind.

"Hey, Lance, I was thinking we should talk," Keith said the moment they crossed their door.

So much for that.

"What? What do we need to talk about? I don't see any talking that should be done right now," Lance babbled, moving towards his desk chair. It was harder to maneuver there, but felt safer than the bed. Higher up, like a throne.

"Your leg, of course." Keith, apparently unconcerned about seating arrangements, settled himself on the corner of Lance's bed, the one closest to the chair. "I saw the face you made when Pidge and Hunk joked about it, and you haven't talked about it in  _ ages _ . I know you didn’t want to worry them, but... is everything going okay?"

Lance let out all the air in his lungs slowly.

"Yeah, sure is. These things take time," he replied diligently, repeating word-by-word what the PT told him the last time he dropped by. "I should be fine soon."

"How long is that, though?" Keith set his hands on his knees and leaned closer. "You've been like this for a while. Is something wrong?"

"Wow, so eager to get rid of me, Keith? Should have thought twice before you offered to help me out." Lance heard the words, the sounds tasting foreign in his mouth. "Don't worry, I'm sure I'll be out of your hair before May 14th."

Keith seemed taken aback at Lance's response. Lance was too, but there was no taking back the words.

"Why that date? The classes don't end until June."

"Oh, come on, was I the only one paying attention, or did Shiro's chiseled good looks distract you? That's the date the ship is coming back," Lance replied, each word twisting his intestines in knots.

"Oh," Keith said, and nothing else.

They simply stared for a minute, both seemingly searching for something on the other's face until Lance couldn't endure it any further. He turned his chair around with his good leg.

"If you excuse me, I have to study."

"Alright," answered Keith, his voice muted inside Lance's head.

It had been an hour, maybe two -Lance wasn't at his most productive, so there was no use on checking the time- before he heard it again.

First his chair was turned violently around, then he heard Keith's voice.

"You think this is about Shiro?!" Keith's face was mere inches away from Lance's. "Is that what you meant by good looks? That I need you out of the way when Shiro gets back?"

"Um. I didn't say that." Not with those words, certainly. "Are you mad?"

"You're such an  _ idiot _ , Lance," Keith groaned, pressing his forehead against Lance's. "But I'm not mad. You're just real dumb."

"You know, I'd rather hear some lukewarm compliments," Lance complained weakly.

"Fine. I hate when you pout because it makes me want to kiss you, but I don't know if I can. And your smile is too bright, I can't ever look at anything else when you got it on."

Lance groaned, even as his body relaxed. "Keith. My man. You're terrible at this."

"Shut up. We both know you're not even studying, let's sit down and watch something."

Keith straightened up and took a couple of steps towards his bed, giving Lance space. Lance glanced at his tablet, even as he felt his cheeks still burning. He hadn’t advanced much on his reading. Hell, he wasn’t even sure about the topic of the article he was on. Was it for or against titanium alloys on engines? Even as he scrolled through it he felt himself give up.

"Yeah, you're right. Did we finish Sharktopus?"

"Yes. Well, I did. You fell asleep on my arm. But don't worry, I got more."

Keith didn't help him up, busy looking for his screen, and Lance didn't ask him to. There was no more talk to be had on the topic.

"Sure, okay."

He climbed on the bed, two hands and one knee, and waited for Keith to join him with a computer. He shrugged off his jacket and boots on the way and watched Keith do the same even as he set up the viewing screen.

It was easy. Comfortable. The warmth of Keith's skin seeped through Lance's shirt, and his presence managed to soothe him down even as his mind kept attempting to run amok. He had even started to get immersed into the hilarious, barely stitched together plot.

Then Keith kissed his cheek.

He blinked.

"What was that for?" he questioned the other boy, watching his profile stare at the screen with an immutable expression.

"Nothing. I just wanted to do it." He glanced at Lance, then back ahead. "Is that okay?"

"Um. Yeah. Yeah, go wild."

He swallowed his  _ Christ, you're so weird _ in response to Keith's short nod, because he was very supportive of getting kissed in general. He'd planned an evening with way more kisses and felt cheated on. He wasn't going to object to any, even if they were nerdy ones. Shrugging to himself, he redirected his mind back to the movie.

Keith kissed him again.

"Oh my god, Keith."

"You said it was fine," Keith replied, his eyes back on the movie. Lance snorted and did the same.

Then another happened.

And another.

Lance refused to acknowledge it, instead attempting to decipher whether there were any patterns to the kisses. His cheeks were starting to hurt from trying to press his smile down, and eventually submitted to the onslaught. The screen forgotten, he fell to the side and let Keith climb over him, pressing butterfly kisses against every patch of skin he could reach.

“Is the movie that boring?” he asked Keith between giggles, barely attempting to push him away. “I was starting to get into it!”

“It can’t compete with you,” Keith replied, slipping a hand under Lance’s shirt. And, just like that, the mood in the room changed. Became thicker, slower, full of intent.

Lance swallowed.

“Wait, wait a moment.” He pushed himself up and slightly away. Keith didn’t try to close the small distance. His hand still rested near Lance’s hip, but his eyes didn’t stray from Lance’s. “Can we do it the other way around?”

Keith let out a breath. They were still close enough for it to move Lance’s bangs.

“What do you mean, the other way around?”

"I mean the other way around from usual." He swallowed. He wondered if he was going to do that a lot. "Like. Me sucking you off."

Keith closed his eyes for a moment.

"I'm not sure once counts as  _ usual _ , but. Yes. Yes we can. Actually, please," Keith added. His hand was creeping up Lance's stomach again.

"Wait, no no no no no, we're going to do this my way. Come on." Lance grabbed Keith's wrist and pushed it down. "You have to let me lead some time."

"It's not my fault you always take so long making up your mind," Keith grumbled, finally acquiescencing.

He stood up from the bed and put the screen on the floor. Immediately he got to work on his remaining clothes. Lance couldn't help but envy Keith's ease of movement: he was still trying to figure a position where he could reach Keith's dick that his leg would be able to sustain for long.

"Wait, stop there," he called out when Keith was about to drop his boxers. "Come over."

It was hard to concentrate with so much skin in front of him. Keith's lean muscles were already making him salivate. Hopefully it'd come in handy soon enough.

It might if Lance could just stop overthinking every single action. He sat with his legs hanging over the edge of the bed and motioned Keith closer, finally grabbing the other boy's hand to get him to take the last steps until he settled between Lance's spread legs. It seemed like Keith had finally managed to understand what Lance was going for. His mouth formed a small o and he reached to rest his hand on Lance's shoulder. He didn't push Lance in any direction, instead just letting it rest there sharing with his obvious attempts at self restraint.

Lance kissed the line above Keith's waistband, smiling at how it made Keith squeeze his shoulder.

"Looking forward to this? I'm flattered." He nuzzled Keith's hipbone while ignoring the obvious tent next to his face. It was warm, warmer than the rest of Keith's skin the other times he'd touched it.

"I hope you do more than just feel flattered. You can't just tell a guy you're going to suck him off and then spend the day watching."

"I'm not going to." Keith's voice, thick with arousal, made Lance wiggle his hips a bit in a faint attempt at releasing the pressure. It didn't quite work. "I just want to take my sweet time with you."

Before Keith could reply, he pulled his boxers down slowly. Keith's dick sprang dangerously close to his face, and Lance couldn't look anywhere else.

Shit, was he bigger than Lance, or was that simply an effect of it being so close?

"Like what you see?" Keith muttered above Lance. The words seemed to take some effort to get out. His thumb brushed the side of Lance's neck. "Come on, don't leave me hanging."

Yeah. Yeah, Lance wouldn't do that. How hard could sucking a dick be? Keith had done it, and he'd been great; though, yeah, Keith being great at something didn't mean much. Tons of people sucked dicks daily anyway. Dicks weren't that difficult to grasp. Lance had one, for fuck's sake.

"You planning to sweet talk me?" Lance mumbled, still stalling.

He reached for Keith's dick with one hand, half to test it and half to just keep it still and away from his face. Warm, as he'd thought. He was immediately rewarded with a low groan and another hand coming to rest on his other shoulder. After it became obvious Keith wasn't planning to reply, he tested his hold with a slow pump. Even with his hand dry Keith seemed to appreciate it, another moan leaving his lips, and Lance had to reach for his own crotch with his free hand.

Not that he was going to jerk off yet. He was a man on a mission.

He squeezed his brain trying to remember anything he'd learned about it. Licking it seemed easy enough, and he started working on it like a popsicle. A warm, soft popsicle that moaned his name. It seemed to work well enough, the spit slowly making the rhythmic slides of his hand easier. Keith's hold on his shoulders was much firmer now, bordering on painful, but Lance couldn't find it in himself to complain. It was utterly satisfying in a way, even as Keith barely let anything out beyond moans and gasps.

Feeling more confident, Lance sucked the head of Keith's dick into his mouth. The precum's taste wasn't too distracting, simply salty on his tongue. He hummed and was startled when Keith's hips threatened to shove it the rest of the way in. Pulling off, he glared up at Keith.

"Dude, not cool."

"Sorry," Keith gasped. Lance noticed just then how fast his chest was heaving, the angle making it more pronounced. "Wasn't on purpose. Please."

Lance snorted. Yeah, not bad for his confidence at all.  _ You got this _ .

He got the tip of Keith's dick back into his mouth again and let the hand around it fall, setting it firmly against the other's hips. Keith seemed to get the hint, his hips staying perfectly still -or as still as constant shaking would allow it- as Lance moved down.

It was a bit harder to coordinate all his limbs than Lance had expected. He was hyper aware of his limbs, of his tongue, of Keith's small noises of pleasure.

He also hadn't expected to like it as much as he did, losing himself in the act. He moved lower, testing his gag reflex. Still there. He'd work on it. Keith didn't voice any complaints for sure.

And then, without warning, liquid was shooting down his throat.

Lance pulled away immediately, coughing and letting it drip over the covers. They should have really done laundry.

"Seriously?" Cough. "Warn a guy next time!"

"I squeezed your shoulder!" Keith protested, his voice cracking just there.

"Newflash, Keith, you've been doing that the whole time." Lance took a gulp of air. "Ew. I mean, better than my eye, I suppose. But let me prepare for it next time."

"Next time?"

Keith was crouching next to him, naked like the day he was born and with a shy smile on his face. He looked positively wrecked, marks of his teeth where he'd been biting his lip.

"Duh." Lance had to look away. "Yeah."

"Wait here."

Keith walked to the bedroom, returning a moment later with a glass and a towel. Lance took the glass and downed it without a word, and let Keith pat his chin dry.

"The covers are a loss," he muttered. Keith pecked him.

"Don't worry about that, we can sleep on mine tonight."

"Yeah, we should. Let's move these to the bag, though."

"We'll be time for that later."

"Later? What do you-" Keith kneeled between Lance's legs, his face framed between Lance's thighs. "Oh. Yes. Later. Definitely later."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> The holidays are a mess, I should stop saying specific timeframes for updates. That aside, I hope everyone enjoyed this chapter! I have the next three completely outlined, and I think it'll be finished with one or two chapters more after those three so please look forward to it!
> 
> I didn't expect this to have so much smut.
> 
> As usual, special thanks to wintery and ezra for their invaluable help!!
> 
> HMU varevare on tumblr or shiroganbatte on twitter!


	9. Chapter 9

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I'm posting this now so I can brace myself for s4 without distractions :O exciting!
> 
> This chapter is very, very, very deserving of the hurt/comfort tag.

Lance woke up full of regret. The regret was solely linked to not having brushed his teeth properly before falling asleep, but it was bad enough to overwhelm him.

Everything else was quite rad. Keith was hugging him from behind, his face burrowed between Lance's shoulder blades. No complaints there. It was actually fantastic to wake up aware enough to enjoy it.

His mouth still required immediate attention, though. Carefully, he grabbed Keith’s hands to dislodge them from his waist. Keith made a soft noise and attempted to pull him closer. His limbs, sleep-heavy, were no challenge. The soft way he called Lance's name was harder to resist, but Lance managed.

Keith was a cuddle monster. Who would've thought.

"Morning, princess." Lance sat up and looked down at Keith. "Slept well?"

"Go back to sleep, Lance," came the sleepy mutter from the pillows. It was hard to see his face under all the hair.

Lance grinned and leaned closer to Keith's face. Keith barely stirred.

"Sooo you liked that, huh?"

An eye appeared from under the mat of black hair.

"That? What do you mean?" The sluggish voice was completely different from Keith's usual morning demeanor. Keith was comfortable. It was a strange realization for Lance.

"The blowjob, duh. My skills really blew you away, huh?" Lance stretched himself to lie next to Keith and indulged in the way the other's eyes (eye, really) traveled down his chest.

"...dunno what you mean."

"What? What does that mean?" Lance huffed indignantly. "You can't fool me. It was amazing and you loved every second of it."

He could feel the way Keith tensed up, the sheets carrying the movement over.

"I don't know what do you want me to say. It was alright." Keith sat up, avoiding eye contact, and rubbed his eyes. "Don't go losing your head about it. Blowjobs are nice in general, it's not a you thing."

"What, so you regret it now?"

"I didn't say that, Lance." Keith moved to the edge of the bed. "Just don't obsess over it. I'm going to take a shower."

"Yeah, well, I still think you're full of shit," Lance snapped, but Keith had completely taken the wind off his sails.

The bed felt colder without Keith in it.

He dragged himself to the edge of the bed, trying to go mentally over his schedule of the day. A class, another class- he didn't particularly care about any. No simulator. Lots of study time.

Meaning lots of overthinking time. Lance could already guess the topics of the day would be "why did Keith give me a blowjob when he doesn't even like me" and "are my teeth too big to suck dick". He was sure someone would have made studies about it; the only question was whether they'd be scientific enough to surpass the Garrison content block.

Not that he was particularly eager to figure it out. Lance simply went through the motions, getting dressed and fixing his hair. Keith seemed to be spending more time than usual in the shower, because the water was still running by the time Lance was all done and holding onto his crutches. Maybe he wanted Lance to go on ahead?

He hated to admit it, but he'd grown used to Keith's company as he made his slow way through the Garrison. It's not like Keith had told him to leave him alone, not exactly. He'd wait.

The door finally opened.

"What took you so long?" Lance questioned moodily, barely sparing a glance. Keith was fully dressed, but he didn't seem any more put together than usual.

"Nothing, just got distracted." Keith seemed to be trying to mess up his hair even further, hiding his face behind it. "Let's get going, I don't wanna be late for aeronautics after that last test."

A very red pair of ears were practically the only thing Lance could see past the bangs, but before he could comment on them, Keith left the room. He still held the door open for Lance, but Lance didn't have it in him to point out his manners.

They walked in silence. The day earlier, if you had asked Lance, he would have said he usually walked with Keith in silence.

_ This _ was silence. There were no jokes exchanged, no light hearted comments on the weather, no speculations about class or who would crush who in the next test. They were so tense with each other, even random classmates Lance didn't knew seemed to stop to give them a glance.

"So, Keith-"

"What!" Keith practically flinched at the words. "I don't want to talk about anything right now."

His face was still red. Lance got the hint and they made the rest of the way down in silence.

_ What the hell happened?!  _ was the sole dominant idea in his mind. He might have to ask Hunk and Pidge for advice- shit, they were leaving for the holidays. As if asking in person wouldn't be uncomfortable enough.  _ Hey bro, I sucked Keith off and now he doesn't want to talk to me. _

Death might be kinder. Not to mention, with how busy Hunk's house was, there were high odds that his parents, or, god forbid, some random baby relative would read it. Why, holidays, why.

And speaking of the devil. A message - De: mami - pinged from the corner of his tablet. Hurriedly, he silenced it before the teacher could catch up on it, and opened it. Not that he particularly wanted to talk about his current obsession with his mother, but talking about anything probably beat suffering in silence.

_ Hola bebe, como estás? Te extrañamos millón. Sé que la clase pilot es difícil, pero acuérdate de tu familia. Estamos todos tristes de que no vienes en tu break. Intenta un facetime este finde, amor. Tu mami que te quiere y está siempre orgullosa de ti. _

Oh, for the love of- 

That  _ definitely _ didn't make him better. It was, like, the last thing he needed right at that moment.

He felt his eyes get wet. He might have to grow bangs like Keith, they would be useful to hide when he was crying in class over his mami telling him she missed him. Damn it all. He wanted to go home, immediately. Get a hug from his mom. Have his older sister call him an idiot for getting so upset about a boy, like he used to tell her when he was a kid. Eat something nice and ask for help to get up without fearing he’d be seen as weak. He wanted  _ home _ .

Another messaged pinged, this time from Keith. Oh, he definitely wasn't opening that one. He switched to his class reading and trying to find the correct section, happy for being in the dead end of the room. No one could see him that way.

Keith made a noise at him. Almost no one, it seemed. Lance ignored it and another message appeared on the top corner again - Keith (2).

And after, a honest-to-god physical note scribbled on a piece of paper appeared on his field of vision, slid over his table by Keith, who was doing his best to appear subtle while stretching his whole body over. Sighing, Lance reached for the note, and Keith immediately resumed his previous position.

_ sorry abt the freak out :( lets talk later _

Lance had to smile, even as his eyes stung. Keith, hand writing a sad face? Maybe Lance was finally rubbing off him. When he glanced over at Keith, the other boy was looking at him, a smile as soft as the one a couple of mornings ago on his face. It twisted Lance's heart up in knots, and he moved back to his reading.

He wanted Keith to look at him like that forever.

He was really, completely, definitely, absolutely, thoroughly fucked now.

Class went on with no further exchanges, and Lance even managed to catch up with most of the topics of the day. It seemed almost easy, easier than getting his mind out of the hole it had buried itself into. If he thought of math, he couldn’t think of how he was letting his family down. When it finished, he shot his mom back a quick message promising to facetime with her after lunch -ha- and walked up to Keith, who was waiting for him at the door.

"Everything okay?" Keith asked tentatively, the blush having long left his face by now. Lance still hadn't asked him about that. The moment had passed.

"Yeah, peachy. Just gotta call my mom later, she's getting upset I'm not dropping by during the break."

"Oh, sorry. It must be nice to be able to see your family like that. Sucks that you have to miss it."

"Yeah, but you know." Lance gestured at his leg. Keith nodded gravely.

"Shady Garrison business. Of course."

Lance winced a bit.

"Come on, it's not shady. It's a regular non disclosure agreement." They started heading down to the library.

"Those usually don't cover work injuries."

"Aw, gonna fight Iverson for me?"

"I could. How long is it gonna take for it to get healed, anyway? I thought you'd be off the crutches right now."

"I-" Lance paused. "I know it's taking a while, but it should be... It's just a bit broken, it's not that serious, I'm sure I'll be better in no time. But maybe it's been too long to say 'in no time', huh?" His voice broke. "Maybe I'll just stay like this forever and never be able to pilot a ship and all this effort will be a waste of time and I'll end up teaching Spanish classes to little kids."

Today wasn't being a very good day. He was going to get dehydrated at this rate. Keith looked completely horrified.

"I- I'm sorry I asked that. I didn't mean to... I'm sure it's healing normally. I've never broken a leg. Let's go study in our room." Keith put his arm around Lance's shoulders and pulled him closer. It spoke miles of Lance's mental status that he let him, in public as they were. It felt warm, and safe, and who cared if anyone who walked past them could see Lance was crying silently. 

He faintly heard Keith mutter something about a sugar crash, apparently more for the passersby than for Lance, and they walked back towards the dorms with Keith working as Lance's second crutch, just holding half the weight by himself instead.

Embarrassing. They got to their room like that. Lance was pretty sure Keith was starting to grow tired of having to drag him back so often. Maybe he should pick up the wheelchair again. He still had it, after all, and Keith would probably be thankful. He thought about asking, but Keith’s dark expression made him change his mind.

When the door opened, Lance limped to the chair. Keith let him go, setting the crutches against the wall, and watched him in silence.

“Sorry, you don’t need to stay. I’m sure you got better things to do.”

Keith nodded. Lance immediately realized he had hoped Keith didn’t have better things to do.

“Wait!” Lance tried to push himself towards the door. The desk chair was no wheelchair, though, and he barely moved a couple inches.

Keith turned towards him, an eyebrow raised. Oh, he was  _ definitely _ done with Lance’s shit now.

“What is it?”

“Do you want to do something later?” Lance rushed out. He didn’t have any ideas, he just needed- wanted Keith to stay.

“Like what?” Keith said.

“Like sex.” Alright, Lance had ideas, they just weren’t good. “We could. Later.”

They weren’t bad either, because Keith had dropped his hand, and his attention was fully on Lance now.

"What do you mean with that?"

Maybe Keith's horrified expression wasn't exactly what Lance had been going for, but he had to work with the hole he'd buried himself in.

"Come on, you know what sex is, right?" He smiled in a way he hoped would be appealing and stretched his arms, arching his back against the chair. "I know you haven't gotten any action since I arrived. Been spending more time in this room than you. Maybe we should fix that, hmm? Help each other out?"

He didn't know what he was doing. Keith had probably bedded their hottest classmates on the reg before Lance had moved in. And if he hadn't -because, fair, he had shown himself to be quite less popular than Lance had thought- it wasn't for lack of options.

Lance, Lance was a virgin whose first blowjob happened less than a week ago.

He was also desperate to keep his crush's attention on him and was more than willing to make rushed, poor choices to do so. It wasn't like they could go on a hike together or have a lot of romantic get aways when Lance could barely walk to class and back.

"We have been having sex, Lance." Keith frowned. Lance wanted to brush his thumb between his eyebrows to ease it up. "Oral sex. It's sex, you know."

"Oh, come on, don't act all innocent now." Lance almost laughed at the hypocrisy of his own words. "You what what I'm talking about. Blowjobs are second base. We can go to third base."

"Third base."

"Tonight."

Was it working? He hoped it was working. Keith gave him a slow once over. Hormones seemed to be winning out, because his face was growing red again.

"You're not being very clear," he insisted, because he wouldn't be Keith if he didn't attempt to be as frustrating as humanly possible in every interaction with Lance.

"I'm asking you to  _ fuck me _ ," Lance snapped, dropping any attempt to sound seductive. "Come back later. We can have sex."

"I- I have class now." Keith stammered, taking a step back towards the door again. Lance saw his chance slipping between his fingers. "You should stay here and rest. You're not feeling well."

"Will you come back?" Lance insisted, his knuckles white from how hard he was gripping the chair's arms.

"Yeah, of course." Keith paused in his retreat. "Why wouldn't I come back? This is my room. I'm just going for class. We can talk about it later."

It dispelled Lance's fear for just long enough to get him to nod and let Keith walk outside without reacting. The moment the door closed behind the other boy, all the panic rose again.

He could barely believe how he'd acted. If Keith had been into him at all, he wouldn't be anymore. It was like Pidge always said.  _ Desperation isn't a good look, Lance. _

And was Keith ever into him? Blowjobs didn't mean much. They just meant you wanted to get off. Lance was _there_ , and Keith didn't like interacting with people in general. Lance was _easy._ Lance was the perfect stand-by for Keith's obvious crush on Shiro.

Stand-by, or placeholder. Shiro wasn't there, he was floating around Kerberos. Keith was suddenly interested on Lance's dick. Coincidence? Think not.

Lance's tablet chimed again. He lifted his head and noticed Keith had set it on his bed. When he pushed himself up to grab it, it hurt to simply open his hands to get a better hold onto the chair. He'd been gripping too hard. Using the crutches was going to be really painful for a bit.

His heart was thumping by the time he reached the tablet. He was dreading a message from Keith, telling him he'd changed his mind and demanded an immediate roommates change.

But no, it was a message from Pidge. The words  _ desperation isn't a good look _ echoed in his head again, and he practically wished to not read it.

He knew, however, he'd just descend further into panic if he didn't, so he swallowed down his nerves and opened it.

_ Hey, Lance, you doing okay? I ran into Keith earlier, he asked me to check on you. Would it be okay to drop by now? _

Great, Keith was washing his hands off him. Lance had to admit he deserved it. He might need help moving back out of the room, this was probably just a preamble to the eviction notice or whatever it was that the Garrison sent.

_ Sure thing, _ he sent back, and dropped both the tablet and himself back on the bed. His head kept swirling in thoughts, too fast to concentrate on any for long, and soon tears prickled at the edges of his eyes.

Soon after, there was a knock on the door. Lance rubbed his eyes as quickly as possible and sat up.

"Come in."

The door opened slowly, and a pair of eyes peeked in.

"It's me," Pidge announced. "I'm alone, no one’s followed me. Can I come in?"

Lance snorted.

"Only if you know the password."

"Is it 'lucky charms’?"

"No, but I'll take it. Come in."

Pidge stepped inside and closed the door, only then giving Lance an once over.

"Man, you look terrible, what happened?"

"Wow, you sure know how to cheer a guy up," Lance replied.

"Oh, come on, you know I didn't mean it like that." Pidge walked up to him and took a seat on the edge of the bed, bumping him with their elbow. "What happened? Did you fight with Keith? He asked me to check on you."

"No, no." Lance sighed. "Just, you know, it's stress. We're both staying in during the break, so we don't have any free time to pack. Not everyone's lucky like you," he teased Pidge.

"Ah... it's about your family, isn't it?" Pidge peeked up at his face. "I know you're close. Bummer that you can't visit.”

“Are you telling me?”

“Come on, seriously, I'm sure we could make up some decent excuse about the leg. You fell downstairs, accident at the gym... there's a lot of options! Come on, Lance. You don’t have to stop living."

"Yeah, yeah, well, that's part of it. But it's better if I don't go, you know? I could use the extra time to keep catching up with the pilot class, and the fam could use the extra money they'd save not paying for my trip. Planes aren’t cheap.”

"Don't give me that, I know you're all caught up by now. Keith told me you even had the best grade on the last Calculus test."

"Keith told you about that?"

"Yeah, sometimes he joins us at the library when you're busy with PT." Pidge's eyes didn't move away from Lance's face for a second. "He talks about you sometimes."

"Oh." Lance paused, trying to process this new information. Pidge’s eyes were eerie. "And what does he say?"

"It's about  _ Keith _ , isn't it! I knew it!" Pidge jumped from the bed and stood up in front of Lance. They were practically at eye level. "Did you break his  _ heart _ ? Oh, did he break  _ your _ heart because if so I'm gonna have words with him-"

"What? No no no, nothing like that!" Lance pushed himself away, ending with his back to the wall. "Who's talking about anyone's heart?"

"Your obvious crush on him."

Lance's eyebrow twitched.

"I don't know what are you talking about."

"Fine, whatever. About his obvious crush on  _ you _ , then." Pidge crossed their arms, giving Lance a no-nonsense look.

" _ You _ don't know what are you talking about." Lance glared. "There's no crush. Not on him, not on me, it doesn't mean anything just because we sometimes-"

He stopped talking a second too late.

"You sometimes what?" Pidge waited for an explanation. Lance didn't provide any, so they continued. "...Okay, you don't have to tell me. What happens between you and Keith is none of my business. But you're my friend, and I don't want you to get hurt."

Lance watched as Pidge's expression fell.

"Don't worry, bro, I know what I'm doing, I promise. I'm just stressed out, that's all."

"Alright," Pidge conceded. "But promise if you're feeling bad or something goes wrong, you'll call me. Even if I'm out of the Garrison.  _ Especially  _ when I'm out of the Garrison. I'm sure Hunk would tell you the same thing, too. We're your friends."

Lance smiled weakly.

"Yeah, I know. Thanks, Pidge."

To his surprise, Pidge climbed back on the bed and extended their arms.

"Hug time?"

Lance's smile grew wider and he wrapped his arms around Pidge.

Two hugs in a day, they should make the day a holiday too. Make the class break even longer. It made Lance feel better. Hugs were good. Maybe, if Keith didn't hate him now, he'd get him to give him another hug later today.

Before the sex, probably, because if the sex happened it'd be a disaster enough to avoid facing each other until the heat death of the universe.

It wasn't appropriate to think about sex when hugging one of your best friends, so Lance held on and thought of puppies for a bit.

"I'm leaving in the afternoon, I'll drop by again to say bye with Hunk," Pidge announced after the hug. "I'm gonna finish packing. You'll tell me if you need help with anything, right?"

"Yeah, don't worry." Lance smiled. "I'll be fine. I'm gonna work on some reading now. Go, don't forget your charger."

"I would never," Pidge laughed.

-

Lance rolled in bed. He said he'd study, but studying became browsing pics from the last time he visited his family. It seemed like ages ago. After a couple hours where study time was obviously useless, he decided to call. It was a short one. His mother knew him too well and could see Lance wasn't up for a chat at that time. Still was a relief to see things were still the same somewhere and that people missed him. The moment he hung up, his brain went back to playing over and over the face Keith did when Lance propositioned him, hours earlier.

He should be all done with class now, shouldn't he? Wasn't he going to come back? Should Lance go search for him? No, bad idea, terrible idea. There was no way Keith wanted to see him if he hadn't come back.

Pidge  _ did _ come back, with Hunk this time, some hours later. The two of them squeezed the breath out of Lance and didn't bring Keith nor Lance's family at all, which he was grateful about. Otherwise, he would have blurted out everything about their not-relationship and his friends would shake their heads sadly and remind Lance that Keith could do much better.

Alright, no, they wouldn't say that. They'd think it, though. There was no way Lance would be able to keep Keith, no matter how much he wanted to now. The sadness seemed to seep through, because his friends hugged him harder and promised to call everyday and bring him home cooking until Lance had to half heartedly push them out of the room. Pidge left with minutes to spare before their bus left, and Hunk insisted he'd drop by again before his own the next morning.

It was then, a couple of minutes back into the silence, that he gave in and texted Keith.

_ Hey, you coming back or ran out into the desert? _

Lance guessed that, if he was going to be the clingy one night stand who couldn't take a no, he might as well own it.

Seeing as a reply didn't come through in the next ten seconds, he threw his tablet to the edge of the bed and picked up a random notebook. He'd doodle or something to take his mind off the message.

Two minutes later, the door to their bedroom opened.

"Lance. Needed something?" Keith called out.

Lance looked up at him, pressing the notebook against his chest.

"Jesus, you almost scared me to death. Where were you?"

"Just researching. Thought it might be important."

Keith stepped into the room, his movements a bit more awkward than Lance was used to seeing. Lance simply watched him as he took off his shoes. Then his jacket. Then he climbed next to Lance on the bed, and Lance realized his own knuckles had one white from how hard he was gripping his notebook.

"Yeah? Changed your mind?" he breathed out.

"I didn't," Keith replied. He crossed the space between them to press a soft, dry kiss against Lance's lips. Before Lance could melt against it, he moved away again. "I said I wanted to talk about it later. It wasn't a no."

"It wasn't?" Lance let out a breath, his posture immediately relaxing.

Keith snorted and moved closer. Lance took advantage of it and rested his forehead against Keith's shoulder.

"Of course not," Keith continued. "Don't be ridiculous. I want to. I want to sleep with you. Just- maybe not today, yeah?" He shook his shoulder a little, but Lance refused to move. "We need to make preparations, it's not like there's vending machines with lube and condoms around the Garrison."

"Ugh, you're making it sound embarrassing." Lance readjusted their positions and set his arms around Keith's shoulders. Keith's arms moved to settle around Lance's waist in return as if they belonged there. "That's not so difficult. I'm sure there's lube at the infirmary. Hell, lotion would do, and I have a lot of that."

Keith snorted. "Yeah, whatever. You make it sound embarrassing too."

"What? I don't!"

"Yes you do. You always want to talk about it, and want  _ me _ to talk about it, and I'm not that good at it."

The gears turned inside Lance's head for a minute.

"Soooo you were embarrassed when I asked you if you liked having me suck your dick?"

Keith let out an aborted squeak and tried to move away.

"Ohhh my God." Lance grinned, pulling Keith closer. "I can't believe it. You're  _ shameless _ with other stuff. Are you telling me you're shy about this?"

Keith tried to pull away again, but Lance's hold on him meant he only succeeded on falling backwards onto the mattress with Lance on top.

"I'm not  _ shy, _ " he insisted, but the defeat was clear in his face.

"It's fine, I like you shy." Lance sighed and set his head against Keith's chest. It was comfortable, like this. And apparently he could still have it for a while longer. "Jeez, I thought you weren't coming back after this morning," he added in a low voice, his eyes already closing. Being in tension for so long wasn't good for his health.

"What was that?"

"Nothing. I'm hungry. Let's go grab dinner."

 

**Author's Note:**

> Special thanks to sage-exe and winterysomnium!
> 
> tumblr: varevare  
> twitter: shiroganbatte


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